Are non-US countries as worried about international outsourcing as the US is?

[Chairman Pow]

I have read a few articles about tech outsourcing, although it is mostly from W. Europe to E. Europe, but as far as manufacturing and etc., how much of a concern, if anything, is it?

[GorillaMan]

It's not a concern in the way it is in the US. As for trade across Europe, it's an intentional part of the European Union. It's true that British manufacturing, for example, has been in decline for many years, despite the economy in general growing. But this has more to do with a strong pound, high labour costs, and a shortage of skills, than it has to do with cheap competition from eastern Europe. We've also been importing goods for a long time from the far east, etc. More recent has been the outsourcing of call-centre, technical support, data processing etc to India in particular. The main reason that this is unpopular with the public is because of problems in the quality of service that often results.

[Aeschines]

AAIK, Japan is not a strong programming country to begin with, so there is not much to outsource there. Second, few non-Japanese are good at Japanese, so there is no chance that call centers could be outsourced.

On the other hand, Indians can be quite good at English.

Industry, however, has for a long time been undergoing what the Japanese call 空洞化: kuudouka, or "hollowing out." Basically this means China, Korea, Malaysia, and other countries make what Japan used to make. Very few televisions, radios, i.e. consumer electronics are made in Japan any more.

[clairobscur]

I would disagree with Gorillaman . It seems to me to be a major concern. Be it in the news, at corner of the street cafe, etc...I hear plenty of people voicing their concerns about outsourcing. Factories are closed and the activities outsourced in asia or eastern Europe, call centers are moved to africa, etc...

A significant part of the support the anti-globalization movement (and it's not like it's unpopular over here) receive is motivated by fears about outsourcing. Strikers on TV explain their factory is about to be closed, despite the company making a lot of money, because it's cheaper to produce whatever they produce somewhere else. Some major companies gave the choice to their employees between reduced wages or...closing the company and losing their jobs. Some of these cases made the headlines. Especially since workers in France are accustomed to much more protections and stringent rules about downsizing, etc...than american workers are.
Politicians have to adress the issue (though they generally don't say anything substantial about it, let alone do anything substantial).


I couldn't tell whether it's as much, less or more of a concern in France than in the USA, but it's definitely something a lot of people are worried about and a frequently mentionned issue.

[GorillaMan]

I think we need to distinguish between actual outsourcing, where a homegrown company decides to shift parts of its operation overseas for cost-saving reasons, and simple competition from world markets which makes western manufacturers uncompetitive, for example.

[Rayne Man]

The well known Spanish fashion chain Zara tried outsourcing for most of its manufacturing. After a couple of years they found that quality control was not up to their standard and brought all their manufacturing back to Spain. They say one reason given was that they like to react fast to new fashion trends and having all their workshops thousands of miles from the design section in Spain was just not working. At the moment Zara is probably one of the most successful fashion businesses in Europe. They now have branches in most European countries

[RickJay]

There's the same concerns in Canada. Interestingly enough, when free trade firt came about, many of the concerns were about outsourcing to the USA, which is perceived as being full of sweatshops you can outsource cheaply to. Now the concerns are mostly about China and India and various other places. I don't share them, but they're here.

[GorillaMan]

Originally Posted by Rayne Man

They say one reason given was that they like to react fast to new fashion trends and having all their workshops thousands of miles from the design section in Spain was just not working.

That's interesting - it's the exact opposite of one of the reasons often given that cheap chains such as New Look have been so successful, in that they can adjust far more quickly to new trends by purchasing from whichever supplier can produce the new products quickest, wherever they may be based. (Perhaps Zara was trying to force an old-fashioned fixed-supply-chain model rather than exploit this new-found flexibility?)

[Rayne Man]

Originally Posted by GorillaMan

That's interesting - it's the exact opposite of one of the reasons often given that cheap chains such as New Look have been so successful, in that they can adjust far more quickly to new trends by purchasing from whichever supplier can produce the new products quickest, wherever they may be based. (Perhaps Zara was trying to force an old-fashioned fixed-supply-chain model rather than exploit this new-found flexibility?)

I think you might be right there . This feature , although a couple of years old , tells you how Zara operates with its own form of vertical integration :- http://bcn.qwe.as/stories/storyReader$53

[Rayne Man]

For some reason that link coding is not working. I am afraid you will have to cut and paste if you want to read the story.