In the midst of the sub-prime market crisis, the recent insolvency of Bear Stearns, and the falling value of the dollar, a source within Dell's Customer Service Division has revealed that the world's third largest computer manufacturer is already in the process of moving it's phone support centers back to the United States. Dubbed "Operation Re-Outsource", or "Resource" for short, the project aims to strategically shift almost 10,000 jobs from India back to the US over the course of three years due to sharply decreasing wages in the US service industry; although Dell had initially sought India as a source of cheap labour, "
that country is just too popular at the moment," said our source. "
Companies forget: as you outsource more and more people, you come to the point where you're almost reliant on India, and businessmen there aren't stupid. They know exactly when they can jack up the price."
The new support centers are to be based primarily in the old Rustbelt of America, where fierce competition from the Japanese has shut down many once productive automobile factories, leaving thousands unemployed. According to our source, "Resource" is aimed at giving these men and women a much needed fresh start in life. And, to ensure that the jobs remain in the US, Dell will be taking a page out of Walmart's book this time around: the computer maker will "strongly discourage" any attempts at unionization in an effort to ensure that prices remain low. However, workers don't seem too perturbed. One man who had signed a preliminary contract with Dell had this to say: "
No, [the union] issue doesn't bother me really. I'm just trying to feed my family, is all, and, the way I see it, any job is better than none."
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