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Extraordinarily insensitive, even for IBM
Feb. 6th, 2009 02:48 pmIBM has never been an employee friendly company. From the days when everyone including the janitor had to turn up in white shirt, regulation blue 2 piece suit, and blue tie, they have behaved more like a dictatorship than a Fortune 500 company. Now they have this information going out to thousands of laid off workers:
"IBM has established Project Match to help you locate potential job opportunities in growth markets where your skills are in demand. Should you accept a position in one of these countries, IBM offers financial assistance to offset moving costs, provides immigration support, such as visa assistance, and other support to help ease the transition of an international move."
The jobs they are offering are in India, at local wage levels. Maybe India's not to your taste. No worries. IBM is also offering to send the newly unemployed to China, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Russia, South Africa, Nigeria, and the United Arab Emirates - all at wages well below what they pay here. And these aren't assignments; they are permanent moves.
Judd Gregg, nominee for Commerce Secretary, believes the H1-B visa program, which is used extensively by software companies to hire software developers from India at below market rates, is good for American jobs. He reckons every time we import a worker under this program, three US jobs are created. Right. He also says the same thing about off-shoring help desks and other service components. We all know how successful the Indian help desk personnel are at trouble-shooting issues. And now the circle is complete; we are going to fill the off-shore jobs with Americans exported by their employers to fill the vacancies left behind by the H1-B visa immigrants.
I truly despair of this situation. President Obama doesn't appear to disagree with Gregg on these two issues; and that worries me greatly.
(Rearrange these words into a well known phrase or saying: Normal fucked situation up all)
"IBM has established Project Match to help you locate potential job opportunities in growth markets where your skills are in demand. Should you accept a position in one of these countries, IBM offers financial assistance to offset moving costs, provides immigration support, such as visa assistance, and other support to help ease the transition of an international move."
The jobs they are offering are in India, at local wage levels. Maybe India's not to your taste. No worries. IBM is also offering to send the newly unemployed to China, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Russia, South Africa, Nigeria, and the United Arab Emirates - all at wages well below what they pay here. And these aren't assignments; they are permanent moves.
Judd Gregg, nominee for Commerce Secretary, believes the H1-B visa program, which is used extensively by software companies to hire software developers from India at below market rates, is good for American jobs. He reckons every time we import a worker under this program, three US jobs are created. Right. He also says the same thing about off-shoring help desks and other service components. We all know how successful the Indian help desk personnel are at trouble-shooting issues. And now the circle is complete; we are going to fill the off-shore jobs with Americans exported by their employers to fill the vacancies left behind by the H1-B visa immigrants.
I truly despair of this situation. President Obama doesn't appear to disagree with Gregg on these two issues; and that worries me greatly.
(Rearrange these words into a well known phrase or saying: Normal fucked situation up all)
