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Foreign outsourcing costs US workers more than just jobs. The impact of outsourcing stretches beyond the employee and has local, regional and global considerations. While many of us work our daily jobs and do our normal day to day tasks we rarely consider how the company down the street or across town affects us directly.
Before exploring the affects, it is best to explain the benefits which cause business to explore and choose this option. The primary consideration is of course, costs. Outsourcing in general allows business to defer functions to a company who specializes in specific services and have scale to handle the volumes at lower costs. An example of this is that of call centers. For a business to have a call center, they must have the hardware and technology. These expenses are on-going to keep up with the competition and typically require IT support staff necessary to maintain the hardware and software. Secondary considerations are the need to have the resources necessary to support the call volume regardless of whether anyone calls. A standard for the Insurance industry is one customer service representative per one thousand members (potential callers). Those reps require salaries, training, supervision, and miscellaneous benefits like vacation time, 401k, and medical and dental insurance. These costs quickly escalate and can exceed $60,000 for a fully loaded employee cost per employee. The cost for the supervision and management can exceed these costs by 25-30%.
The alternative is to find a company who manage and staff call centers. They typically provide a single price and cover all the costs of the center and are accountable to maintaining service levels, hiring and retaini ...