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Jobless recoveries are an interesting animal. IBM is not the only company participating in off-shoring of jobs. It's terrible to hear of such events in the USA but the sad truth is that many people seem to forget that corporations are not citizens and therefore they have no borders. Having been part of a large corporation and having observed several downsizing events (BTW I was downsized in 2007), it's interesting to note that senior management is almost exclusively rewarded for fnancial performance irrespective of how it is achieved. I personnally observed from the inside a large corporation with over 24,000 employees intentionally shift the work force from less than 10% overseas to more than 45% in a span of less than 6 years. It can and is being done across America and across industries.

PS: If you can show instances where off-shoring proved detrimental to IBM and its charter to maximize profits, that would be entirely different.

Too all those of you who expressed support in this forum to IBM or similar actions: one day you personally will find yourself out of work no mater how secured you think your job is because of these strategies and then I want to see how you will react to these labor migration strategies. If this will continue US will wipe out the technological advantage in the semi industry in less then 15 years not to talk about the fact that you personally will have to move to other countries and significantly lower your standard of living if you want to stay in the semi/high tech industry. You guys think only about companies profits, you have to think about societies as well, by wiping out the middle class in US these companies will just undermine their own profits in the short to mid term, you guys thing that China and India will bail out IBM or other companies on the long term ? they will just copy their technology and leave these companies dry. The problem with these companies is that their top management and share holders are blinded by their bonuses and compensation w/o considering their actions consequences in the Global Economy complex.

From someone formerly within those Blue walls:

"null" is right up there. You can always tell the layoffs are coming when the job board is empty. And usually transfers between divisions aren't allowed at the time.

To put this in personal perspective, I left IBM a few years ago after 15 years there. IBM management made a good decision to disband my department since the market was going away from what we produced, but they were pretty heavy handed in how they laid us all off and did the usual tricks of cutting off transfers and shutting down the job board.

Personally, I had an offer from IBM R&D that would have required VP permission since it was an interdivision transfer and I had another offer from within the division that wasn't on the job board. I choose to leave, however. I'd had enough of the pain. Life is better on the outside.

All said, IBM is doing something that makes business sense by outsourcing. It delivers somewhat worse results at lower cost and that seems acceptable to most businesses now.

The problem is that the US has structured its regulations, taxes, and trade policies to favor outsourcing rather than insourcing; viewing American business as too good to fail and immune to regulation isn't realistic. We won't recover until saner policies return. But I won't hold my breath about that happening.

Ahhh, "tparty", spoken like a true manager.

Show me the data..

I've been in communities (i.e., Poughkeepsie/Kingston) when/where IBM pulled it's shenanigans and saw the personal and local economic impact and the tragic toll it took on peoples lives. If a group of foreigners came and had the same results as IBM "rightsizing" we would be at war with them right now.

Ahhh, I look forward to the day when Management positions are "outsourced".

Ah, the classic union argument that we are exploiting other countries...I think most workers in the third-world factories would beg to differ. Their salaries, benefits, conditions, etc. are low by most US standards, but in general are far better than what they experienced before the factories came to town. Are the countries that have completely blocked foreign investment and free trade better off than those that haven't...are North Koreans better off than South Koreans? Burma better off than Thailand? If we really care about foreign workers (and I would argue that most people who make Joe K's argument really do not care much about foreign worker conditions...they care about job protection in the US) then we should encourage factories, free trade, and the rule of law. Opening up to foreign economies is the way to bring them up to first-world standards, not closing ourselves off to them.

Do you think the call center workers in India are better off than the Indians cutting grass with scissors? (yes, been to India and observed that...the abject poverty
there is shocking) We are creating a middle class there with jobs that are high pay by Indian standards, low pay by US standards. Call center jobs in India are considered a ticket to success. Don't pretend to care about those workers by saying we are exploiting them. They are not slave labor. Do you think it would get better for them if we blocked trade? Seems more likely that a few more people would be sleeping in the roadside dirt in Delhi. The principle of "protecting foreign workers" may be noble, but has the opposite effect in most applications and is a smokescreen for protecting domestic jobs. If you believe in protectionism for domestic jobs, fine, but don't miscontrue that as protection for foreigners.

This is not to excuse the many parts of the world where workers are in dire conditions...child workers, exposure to lead or industrial chemicals, and much more...but this is to say that protectionism does not improve those conditions. Should we continue to clamour for decent working conditions in any factory where US imports are made? Yes, absolutely. But should we shut our doors to imports, or claim that it is somehow unfair to the foreigners that we manufacture on their soil?

Free trade and a flexible economy is what made our country great. Do we want to go the route of France, where workers have been known to hold management hostage when layoffs are announced? Do you think that encourages management to expand or build the next factory in France?

There are three groups with an interest in what a company does: employees, customers, and stockholders. What are a company's obligations to the employees? At the minimum, telling the truth. If the company is not completely straight with the employees, why should the customers and stockholders think that they are getting the straight skinny?