RE: Boeing Tech Pubs going offshore? (long)

[SteveFJong -at- aol -dot- com]

This issue has nothing to do with the professionalism or subject-matter 
expertise of technical writers. It doesn't even have to do with technical writers. 
It has to do with a brutally simple economic formula: the offshore workers are 
one-third as expensive. At that rate, as has been pointed out, Boeing could 
get three revisions for the price of one. You can't compete with that kind 
dynamic by getting smarter, more experienced, or more professional; the only way 
to compete would be to produce three times as much (or more) at the same 
quality level--or drop your salary requirements by two thirds.

This is all part of the same market economy in which you go to a superstore 
and buy commodities at everyday low prices, but if you have a question or a 
problem you might as well be on Gilligan's Island for all the help you're gonna 
find. It's the same deal as going to the gas station and pumping your own and 
never seeing an employee. And when you get your purchase home, if there's a 
problem, you log in to a Web site and hope that yours is a frequently asked 
question.

I don't wish for bad things to happen to a Boeing aircraft due to outsourced 
documentation, but I must report that ValueJet went out of business after a 
Florida crash, the root cause of which was outsourced mechanics. (They didn't 
know they were shipping a load of full oxygen canisters in the cargo bay, and 
they were unaware it was a Bad Thing.)

If you pull back the focus far enough, you see that almost all knowledge jobs 
can be outsourced, but the national economy is based on consumer spending. 
Outsource all the jobs and you eliminate your customers.

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