1-800-INSOMNIA

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Tomorrow night, PBS stations in the U.S. are airing a documentary on the human impact of outsourcing on call center workers (via SAJA):

1-800-INDIA
Tuesday, September 13 at 9 P.M.

… “1-800-INDIA” explores the experience of young Indian men and women who have been recruited into these new jobs requiring long hours, night shifts, and westernized work habits. The film reveals the human and cultural impact of a sweeping global trend, exploring its effect on Indian family life, on the evolving landscape of Indian cities and towns, and on the aspirations and daily lives of young Indians, especially women, entering the workforce.

Blogger Daniel Drezner penned an introduction:

Ironically, India itself now has some other pressing concerns because of the expansion of the global market for outsourcing services. Wage rates in Bangalore are starting to rise dramatically, and India has bottlenecks in its educational infrastructure that will limit the growth of the labor force. So other countries — the Philippines, Indonesia, Ghana — are beginning to compete. Nowadays you can even find Europeans and Americans working — if only temporarily — in India. Backpackers hiking through India stop off in Bangalore and work in call centers for a few weeks to pay their way…

… where things really are likely to take off within India is in terms of increased demand for local goods and services — a situation is developing in which the Indian economy isn’t paying attention just to what the U.S. market wants, but to what the Indian market wants. And that’s what’s driving these associated booms in construction and retail. The benefits that were initially concentrated in the IT industry are now diffusing through the rest of the Indian economy…

… there are Silicon Valley firms that experimented with offshore call centers in Bangalore, found them too costly, and decided to outsource operations to Oklahoma instead…

Economics is not a zero-sum game. The fact that a middle class is developing in India does not automatically mean the middle class in the United States is threatened. The nice thing about economics is that it’s a win-win game.

15 thoughts on “1-800-INSOMNIA”

  1. What ever happened to that guy who was going to backpack through India with no money while being videotaped? You guys posted about it a while ago. This whole working at a call center thing would have been perfect for him!

  2. Backpackers hiking through India stop off in Bangalore and work in call centers for a few weeks to pay their way

    How does that work? I thought India was weird about working w/o a work visa.. deported that Norwegian model and all.

    As someone who is looking into an internship in India in coming months, this is quite interesting to me.

  3. Last I heard about foreigners (read as whites) working in India was restricted to mainly working as extras in Bollywood movies. Since Indian directors for some weird reason like to have whites dancing with the hero I heard they come on to the sets and work for a couple of days which pays them enough to sustain them for a month or so.

    Coming to Andrea’s question: In India everything is possible. As long as you are low profile nobody will question you. Large institutional operators might not hire foreigners but there are plenty of small scale call centres who might be perfectly willing to take some on.

  4. How does that work? I thought India was weird about working w/o a work visa.. deported that Norwegian model and all.

    Theoretically, you need to have an employment visa from the company which has hired you before entering India. Unless you are a PIO then the rules are bit different, I think.

  5. “India is an ideal place to work… with comfortable accommodations and suitable stipends. After me, several of my friends have joined here. It’s fun,” says Jeanne Moore, who is working at a BPO centre in Gurgaon. Backpackers and college graduates from US and several European countries are being hired by American and British companies to work in India-based call centers in an attempt to bridge the culture gap between agents and customers.

    Looks like backpackers are being hired.

  6. I have a brown American friend who worked for FOUR YEARS in Bombay with no visa. She just kept coming back in repeatedly on a tourist visa. The company has offices all over the world so they could have probably sorted something out but never bothered.

  7. saw something on pbs about india and the outsourcing changing family structure and such a few months ago….

    things be a changing folks…..

    hmm.. kinda makes me want to get my bagpack and head on over to the homeland folks..

  8. I have a brown American friend who worked for FOUR YEARS in Bombay with no visa. She just kept coming back in repeatedly on a tourist visa. The company has offices all over the world so they could have probably sorted something out but never bothered.

    Oh also “persons of indian origin” (includes upto the 4th generation of Indians born abroad) can get a PIO card, this gives you the ability to work in India and some other rights that can come in handy if you plan on doing business there or something like that.

    Non-PIOs do legally require a work visa, I am pretty sure they need to get it before entering the country.

    Then again this is hypothetical, in actu this is not enforced

  9. epoch, true; also, it would be nice if theory were met with practice

    Re Drezner’s comment about economics not inherently being a zero-sum game: Yes, we can increase global purchasing power, but we cannot all get richer when the supply grows faster than demand. The supply in this case is educated english-speaking labor and the demand is of the products requiring such labor. Globally, while countries like India and China have emerged with vast, competent workforces, their consumer appetite, and more so ours, has grown at a slower rate than supply. Global software purchases have grown at rates in the low double-digits or high single-digits. The bogie of outsourcing is a non-issue, it doesn’t really matter if it’s India or “home” in Alabama, the end result of this increased supply and meagre demand for finished products will spell sluggishness for the careers of those professionals with higher wages. It affects higher waged individuals more because of the greater supply of replacement. There’s obviously a smaller pool of supply to replace lower-waged individuals for equal or lesser pay. Revitalization can occur only if demand either picks up drastically – and this demand doesn’t necessarily need to be domestic – or the international labor supply stagnates to allow global demand to catch up.

  11. did Time Warner screw me? I sat there, patiently at 9 last night and my PBS didn’t show it 🙁 Did I have the right September 13th?

  12. DesiDancer – did you have the right PBS? I had to check a few in NYC before I found it.

    Glad I did. For a short documentary, this piece covered a lot of ground. Fascinating to see the impact of the trickle-down effect: the guys setting up food carts outside the offices in the middle of the night, the car driver that was able to secure a contract and purchase a fleet of cars to transport the employees, and the local economy getting a boost by a new financially independent (and eager to spend) younger generation.

    The social angle was interesting as well. Lot of focus on increasing confidence and challenging established mores: interfaith relationships, career transition (doctors becoming operators) and career development (management teams, promotion tracks).

    I didn’t get to catch the post-show Bill Moyers segment, will have to wait for a rerun.

  13. Desi Dancer, it was on Channel 13/WNET on Time Warner Cable. Hmmmm… very strange that you didn’t get to catch it. (I am sure it will rerun.)

  14. DAMN. Right day, wrong channel; I was watching the other PBS, channel 23 or something. 🙁

    you’re right, I’m sure they’ll repeat it. I’m bummed to have missed it.