Outsourcing and flat world

Princeton economist and
former Federal Reserve governor Alan S. Blinder believes that 40
million service jobs are in danger of being shifted abroad, including
those in professions like radiology, engineering and “maybe even
college teaching.” If so, that would cause dislocations. A 2005
best-seller on this topic by New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman,
which Blinder has cited for inspiring his own projections, affirms the
disturbing sea-change with the metaphorical title, The World is Flat.

The world has definitely gotten smaller, as UCLA
economics professor Edward Leamer allows in a highly critical review of
Friedman’s book. But what Friedman describes as the flatness of the
“global, Web-enabled playing field that allows for multiple forms of
collaboration — the sharing of knowledge and work — in real time,
without regard to geography, distance, or in the near future, even
language” — does not reflect current reality.

Source: online.barrons.com

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