Thread: US Tax Dollars to Train Foreign Workers

Well, they are doing it again. This was posted here in 2006: http://www.alipac.us/ftopicp-1100331.html

Clearly this is an ongoing program. And InfoNet reports they just discovered a similar program in Armenia! (see next post for Armenia)

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/government/ge ... -jobs/9253

Get angry: your tax dollars are being used to train foreign IT workers to take your jobs
By David Gewirtz | August 5, 2010, 7:09am PDT


OK, now I’m angry for real. By the time I’m done explaining this — if you’re an American — you’re going to be livid as well.

This upsets me so much, it’s difficult to type, but here goes. The U.S. government is spending $22 million to train workers in foreign countries to learn tech skills and English so they can outsource American IT jobs.

I know. I can hardly believe it myself.

According to InformationWeek, the U.S. agency known as USAID (United States Agency for International Development) is partnering with outsourcing service companies in countries like Sri Lanka to teach more than 3,000 workers technology skills in tools like Enterprise Java. http://www.informationweek.com/news/sof ... =226500202

To make it easier for those workers to work with American companies who have outsourced work, American taxpayers are also paying to train the workers in English.

While writing How To Save Jobs, I spent a year researching this issue and I wrote about just how damaging outsourcing is to American jobs. We’ve had recent reports showing that people without jobs here in America will likely remain without jobs for a long time.

That’s bad enough. But the idea that our own government is funding the training of low-wage foreign workers, who will then compete with American IT workers is simply unacceptable.

In my book, I showed how it is possible for America to turn things around, but we have to first stop many of the wrong-headed policies we’re operating under.

This is one such policy. I urge you, without waiting a minute, to contact your elected representatives. Tell them it’s time they got off their collective posteriors and stop this USAID outsource training program.

Visit this list of representatives by state.
Do it now. Before your tax dollars are used to train people who will do your job for 1/10th your salary. By the way, if you’d really like to see how to solve the job problem, download How To Save Jobs at http://usspi.org/ It’s free and it’s worth the read.

OK, I know I’m starting to sound like an anti-administration conservative and I’m not. I’m just a cranky patriot. Idiocy like this makes me angry, regardless of which party is in power. What the frak where they thinking?

http://www.informationweek.com/news/sto ... =226600094

Now It's Armenia: USAID Funds IT In Eurasia


After pledging millions to bolster outsourcing in South Asia, federal agency extends largesse to a new recipient.

By Paul McDougall
InformationWeek
August 5, 2010 03:09 PM


Even as controversy mounts over its funding of IT outsourcers in South Asia, the U.S. Agency for International Development has announced a program under which it will partner with the government of Armenia—a nation anxious to lure computer work from American shores--to promote the development of the country's information technology industry.
Jonathan Hale, USAID deputy assistant administrator for Europe & Eurasia, is on a four-day trip to Armenia to meet with government and private industry leaders in the country. On his agenda is a meeting with Armenian economic minister Nerses Yeritsyan.


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Fibre Channel Over Ethernet Is Catching On As Data Centers Consolidate and Server and Storage Virtualization Takes Off"We look forward to partnering with USAID on the IT sector, which has great potential as Armenia has an advantage in this sector," Yeritsyan said in a statement released by USAID. "We want companies to come to Armenia and create their innovative environments," Yeritsyan said.
Among other things, Armenia is looking to establish itself as a center for low-cost IT and engineering work outsourced from the U.S. and other Western countries.

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USAID, a taxpayer-funded federal agency, did not disclose how much it's contributing to Armenia's efforts to become a global IT competitor. Among the U.S. companies participating in the project is Oracle's Sun Microsystems unit.

Word of USAID's mission to Armenia comes a day after InformationWeek disclosed that the agency is contributing millions of dollars to an effort that aims to help Sri Lanka establish itself as a player on the international outsourcing stage.

Under director Rajiv Shah, whom President Obama appointed to run the agency in January, USAID will partner with private outsourcers in Sri Lanka to teach workers there advanced IT skills like Enterprise Java (Java EE) programming, as well as skills in business process outsourcing and call center support.

USAID will also help the trainees brush up on their English language proficiency. USAID is contributing about $10 million directly to the $36 million project.

USAID's efforts to help build up IT and outsourcing industries in Europe and Asia would seem to run counter to Obama's public pledges to keep more hi-tech jobs in the U.S., where unemployment in the technology industry continues to run high.

"This action is contradictory to Obama’s commitment to create jobs and revitalize the American economy," said Rennie Sawade, a spokesperson for WashTech, a Communications Workers of America affiliate that represents IT professionals. "Any taxpayer money that is appropriated to train workers to take American jobs should, without question, be directed toward the unemployed and the underemployed in this country," said Sawade.

USAID officials did not respond to requests for comment.