$4,400/Yr. Coders May Work On Dept. of Labor Project 418
theodp writes "To power the Tools for America's Job Seekers Challenge, the US Department of Labor tapped IdeaScale, a subsidiary of Survey Analytics, which is headquartered in Seattle with satellite offices in Nasik, India and Auckland, NZ (PDF). According to the Federal Register (PDF), an Emergency OMB Review was requested to launch the joint initiative of the DOL, White House, and IdeaScale to help out unemployed US workers. A cached Monster.com ad seeks candidates to work on the development and maintenance of ideascale.com, but in India at an annual salary of Rs. 200,000 to 300,000 ($4,4000 to $6,600 US). BTW, an earlier White House-sponsored, IdeaScale-powered Open Government Brainstorm identified legalizing marijuana as one of the best ways to 'strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness.'" There's no guarantee that Indian workers recruited by that Monster.com ad would work on US Department of Labor projects.
It's Worse Than You think! (Score:5, Insightful)
I have this weird feeling that had they gone with American services for building these websites at 10x the cost of using IdeaScale, the Slashdot summary would have read about the absurdly high spending that the Department of Labor is wasting our tax dollars on and would have something about a cursory glance finding tons of companies willing to fullfill the work order for 1/10 what they spent. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. They picked the route that most CEOs today are picking and they saved us from more tax dollar expenditures. Pick your poison.
And don't tell anybody but I think Obama's coffee mugs are
BTW, an earlier White House-sponsored, IdeaScale-powered Open Government Brainstorm identified legalizing marijuana as one of the best ways to 'strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness.
So because IdeaScale built an application to spec for the White House (who shouldn't have paid for it if it didn't meet requirements) and a bunch of pothead hippies turned up in full force to get their message out loud and clear on it, it's IdeaScale's fault? I think you'd be better off blaming the concept of democracy or the buzzword 'crowd-sourcing' as this is just kind of evidence of a technology-based bias of the voices.
You criticize the White House for doing something we all do then you blame the wonderful effects of democracy on a web application?
Increase American employment through outsourcing (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:4, Insightful)
Thread over in one, good job.
Don't Worry... (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't worry. I'm sure they'll be billed back to the Dept. of Labor at 100k per year, +20% finder's fee.
When it comes to programming (Score:3, Insightful)
You get what you pay for.
A lot of people tend to think that just because the person is over in India they'll be willing to work for a sub-average wage. Which, given regular circumstances, is generally true. Coding is another thing all together. If you live in a poverish state, you can't be expected to know C++. In fact it might be a stretch to say you know how to operate a computer. Those people who get hired for "Tech Support" aren't guru's by any means (and I think we all knew that). But they have been trained how to handle with customers, the basics of operating a computer, and are given a good list of responses. Programming is not something you can train "on the job". You need previous knowledge on the basics of computers. Then you need to learn a bit of program theory, how it all works. Lastly you need to learn the Syntax of various languages. A lot of people drop out when they can't deal with the Syntax. Some people drop out when they can't get the theory. Some people just don't like computers. You can't hire someone off the street and think that within a short time they'll be able to pick up all of those skills.
That's not to say there aren't educated programmers that come from developing countries. Every once in a while a hard working family will be able to afford an education, and once they have that education, they usually fly stateside to make more money. They know that with their education they can be making way more money than 4400 USD a year. So they go and tack an extra digit to that paycheck, keep half and the other half is more than enough to either fly the family to the States or support them in India.
Basically what it boils down to, they're going to get some guy who can talk the talk but not walk the walk. He'll agree to $4400 a year for as long as he can hold the job since he was only make $1000 a year back at his old job. Because anyone who knows what they're doing knows they are worth more.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree with most of what you said, but legalizing marijuana is not an idea only supported by "pothead hippies".
I've never smoked _anything_, nor done any illegal drug in my life and I'm in full support of legalizing marijuana. I believe I'm not the only one out there either.
Resources - Hemp is an awesome product all around (Paper, fabric, etc).
Save money - Stop jailing people for negligible amounts of recreational marijuana (read: not for distribution).
Save more money - Stop most of the ridiculous "war on drugs" and the exorbitant spending and manpower on the marijuana aspect of it.
Make money - Taxation on marijuana just like cigarettes.
Those are just a few tangible benefits.
Only hippies support it indeed.
Why So Flamebait, Chums? (Score:5, Insightful)
What's with all the anti-administration flamebait recently? Yesterday, submitted as fact, were a set very dubious allegations that turned out to be false, surprising almost no-one. Today, we're supposed to get upset because an American company that also hires workers in India gets a contract to hire workers in America, and reprise the anger we felt when fratards overwhelmed a lackluster public response to an Obama administration suggestion box with their gormless suggestion to 'save the economy' by legalizing a plant that grows like a weed. What gives?
Re:200000 or 300000 in India is very low (Score:2, Insightful)
Socially acceptable (and considered good) living conditions are achievable with these salaries in India. Minimum wedge in "Federal" US means probably some dingy old apartment and living on free food from Mcdonalds.
BTW: Can you afford a full time housekeeper on minimum wedge in US?
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:4, Insightful)
You criticize the White House for doing something we all do then you blame the wonderful effects of democracy on a web application?
It's the American Way. Shifting blame is pretty easy.
Repeat after me. "I think its your fault".
Now wasn't that fun?
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone I speak with agrees that pot should be legalised just like in the Netherlands. That way you can keep much better control over it.
I agree that it should be legalized (pursuit of happiness and all that) but I'm not so sure that I buy the "you can keep much better control over it" line. When I was a kid I had no problems getting my hands on booze or tobacco and both of those products are legal. We always knew which store we could go to that wouldn't card us, which 21+ sibling of a friend would make a straw purchase and whose parents were too lazy to lock up the liquor cabinet.
So no, I don't buy that legalizing pot would make it harder for the kiddies to get their hands on it. The only thing that will do that is parental involvement but I heard that went out of fashion a long time ago and the current trend is to rely on the TV and internet to raise your kids.....
Re:outsourcing (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:5, Insightful)
Save more money - Stop most of the ridiculous "war on drugs" and the exorbitant spending and manpower on the marijuana aspect of it.
Not just the marijuana aspect. All aspects. Legalization would bring the price down by a hefty percentage, which would make marijuana even more attractive compared to the other choices. Plus, it's often argued that marijuana is a gateway drug... which I actually agree with. But why? It has a reputation as a relatively harmless substance. People are willing to buy it off of just about anyone. So you find a guy, you buy from him a few times, and when he's always delivered decent goods you start to have some faith in his products. You feel like trying something else, you go to the same guy who's been supplying marijuana to you. Now if you legalize that first guy stops being a dealer and instead is a corner deli that won't carry anything illegal. The dealer has lost a major trust building product. Of course this won't completely eliminate drug traffic (IMO, nothing ever will), but it'll make a bigger dent than anything else we could possibly do.
Re:Increase American employment through outsourcin (Score:1, Insightful)
A lot of people will make the argument that "you can't blame people for going with the cheapest option out there that can get the job done". They say it's the American and capitalist way. After all, it's our fault as employees for not being competitive with our salaries. Brushing aside the whole "...while we give these same companies major tax breaks and incentives and our own government won't even employ us to do our own jobs... that our own taxes are paying for", the major problem is that we *can't* compete.
How can I compete with someone who makes $4,400/yr and yet live in America? They want to pay me Indian wages while paying American prices. After tax and other required withdrawals, that $4,400/yr wouldn't even cover the gas to get to and from work. I'd need an entire second salary just to pay for parking while at work.
Re:full-time? really? (Score:1, Insightful)
I was told that that's bullshit and that Indian professionals actually earn in excess of $20,000 per year.
Ah. So, instead of being paid less then a 10th of what an American is getting paid, they're making about a quarter to a third of what an American is getting.
I feel better now.
The Inconvenient Truth (Score:4, Insightful)
Hey, I'm in the US, and it's obviously true. It's just inconveniently true.
Our anti-pot drug policies eliminate any possibility of salutary tax revenue from an industry that's worth billions even as a black market. In addition to that, we have to catch, try and incarcerate pot growers, sellers, and users at staggering expense (also billions, when all is said and done).
Pot is basically as harmless as alcohol, but since we force our educators and police to demonize it even while half of them use it themselves, we undercut the entire credibility of our anti-drug programs (which are important for helping kids avoid drugs that are actually dangerous). So not only do we get no tax on billions, but we spend billions, and we contribute to actual drug problems (at what additional cost I hesitate to guess).
We could still try the tired argument that pot really is dangerous. We have to hope not, since a huge portion of the population admits to using it in studies. The Netherlands notwithstanding, three of our last three presidents have admitted to using various illegal drugs and got elected anyway.
The open government brainstorming application worked perfectly. It distilled a set of great ideas directly from citizen activists with less lobbying, filtering and political BS.
Legalizing pot would be a great idea. It would cut waste, generate revenue, empty prisons, improve the health and safety of the nation's youth. It's too bad Obama absolutely cannot and will not do it. It would be political suicide. And that gets us into analyzing the particular hues that the fascinating kaleidoscope of American politics puts over reality...
Either way, you can't blame the app, or the app's developer for doing an unusually good job, just because the truth is embarrassing for the "national psyche."
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:5, Insightful)
"Have you ever tried simply turning off the TV, sitting down with your children, and hitting them?" - Bender
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe you were going for funny, but there are a surprising number of people who think that the law is what keeps people from smoking pot, shooting heroin, etc. They really believe that if the government suddenly legalizes heroin there will be a run for the pharmacy. It apparently never occurs to the that they aren't about to do so, and they are not "special" [ at least not in that way ;-) ], or that the people who are likely to do heroin are already doing it, law be damned.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone I speak with agrees that pot should be legalised just like in the Netherlands. That way you can keep much better control over it.
I agree that it should be legalized (pursuit of happiness and all that) but I'm not so sure that I buy the "you can keep much better control over it" line. When I was a kid I had no problems getting my hands on booze or tobacco and both of those products are legal. We always knew which store we could go to that wouldn't card us, which 21+ sibling of a friend would make a straw purchase and whose parents were too lazy to lock up the liquor cabinet.
I think what most people think with better control (at least what I believe, and I've heard others say) is you don't have to worry so much about what is in it. (ie not laced with something).
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:1, Insightful)
I would rather spend a little extra tax money, and buy American. After all, it would be nice to have that money circulating within the US after the work is done. However, the money paid to the Indian workers will be untaxed (aside from corporate profits), and the money they earn will almost certainly not be spent in US.
This also encourages the idea of outsourcing. Just because others are doing it, it does not mean that it is a valid approach. What did our mother's tell us? If the other executives are jumping off of a bridge, will you?
At the exact same time, there is a very strong constant coming out of the Indian outsourcing: low quality work. I am sure there are some high quality examples, but they are certainly the exception and not the rule.
So, if it comes down to picking my poisons: cheap, low quality, out-of-country labor versus not-cheap, higher quality, in-country labor, then I choose the more expensive route.
Also, I strongly doubt the President has some cheap, Made-In-China mugs. The secretaries et al might, but I doubt they go cheap when it comes to the President's luxuries, which every President gets.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, yes, I criticize the White House for doing what I'm doing.
It's not my job to keep the country's economy running. Well, it maybe should be, but things aren't running that way. The government, on the other hand, has NO other job than to keep the country healthy and in good shape, economically and otherwise.
So yes, I expect them to better buy domestic stuff. From cars to coffee to developers. What do you think we'd get to hear if the new "official" government cars are from Kia or Toyota? Or, after all they're supposed to be presentable, how about a nice BMW or Mercedes?
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:4, Insightful)
Everyone I speak with agrees that pot should be legalised just like in the Netherlands. That way you can keep much better control over it.
I agree that it should be legalized (pursuit of happiness and all that) but I'm not so sure that I buy the "you can keep much better control over it" line. When I was a kid I had no problems getting my hands on booze or tobacco and both of those products are legal. We always knew which store we could go to that wouldn't card us, which 21+ sibling of a friend would make a straw purchase and whose parents were too lazy to lock up the liquor cabinet.
So no, I don't buy that legalizing pot would make it harder for the kiddies to get their hands on it. The only thing that will do that is parental involvement but I heard that went out of fashion a long time ago and the current trend is to rely on the TV and internet to raise your kids.....
Keep in mind that "better control over it" isn't limited to keeping it away from under-age users. It also means the application of agricultural and consumer protection laws that we enjoy in regard to our legal vices.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
> Enforcing a license violation is a lot cheaper than sticking someone in county jail for a couple of months.
Ah, and there is the problem. A lot of for-profit jails and prisons will lobby legalization out of existence. Pharmaceuticals selling prescription meds will add their army of lobbyists to the cause.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
Look at smokes and booze. We still have blackmarkets for these things. Mostly pretty small for cigarettes because of ease of access but booze is still a problem and considering the health risks of moonshine it is amazing how many people still buy the stuff just to get around the taxes.
Not already? (Score:3, Insightful)
You mean like Blackwater?
The whole article is a confusing non sequitur... (Score:5, Insightful)
Good god, that’s hard to follow. There are so many links I can’t tell which one is the main article, there are acronyms that I don’t recognise, and it’s not tied together at all. The flow of information just jumps from one thing to another with little apparent connection between them. It’s also incorrect.
Let me see if I’m understanding this, and make it easier to follow...
Now we hit the first non sequitur... how is the development and maintenance of ideascale.com related to the Jobs for America’s Job Seekers Challenge?
The connection is – apparently – that the same people developing and maintaining the IdeaScale website will presumably also be designing the platform to “allow toolmakers and developers to present their free online job tools to workforce development experts and jobseekers for discussion, rating, and voting”. That’s a bit of a stretch, but okay. (As kdawson correctly pointed out, “There’s no guarantee that Indian workers recruited by that Monster.com ad would work on US Department of Labor projects.” Wait a second... did kdawson actually get something right? At any rate that still doesn’t make up for posting this atrocity to begin with.)
Now we hit the second non sequitur... what does IdeaScale’s other contest/survey have to do with this one, other than being hosted by the same company? Does the results of a previous survey on how to “strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness” have anything to do with this contest? They have no control over the results of the project: they’re just designing the system to take submissions and allow people to vote on them...
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
Better than that... kdawson basically refuted the whole point of the article at the end. The article was over before anyone even commented.
Re:full-time? really? (Score:3, Insightful)
$20,000 in India only buys you slightly older developers with undergraduate degrees, five years experience and about the same quality of work. One enormous (really enormous, like freight train enormous...) American heartland transportation company found that every hour of time worked by an Indian subcontractor required at least 20 minutes of stateside integration and clean-up of the code, as well as correction of wrong logic in the unit tests. With 200 foreign contractors working 8 hours a day, the company needed 66 full-time local IT employees just to keep up with integration.
When asked by an employee (a former foreign contractor herself who had naturalized) if he was concerned about the quality of the code coming from the contractors in Hyperbad, the CTO of the company gave a short and surprising answer (really short, like the length of a railroad spike, short). He said, "I don't care about the quality of the code. Do you know how much money we're saving?"
It sounds to me like this company is in for a long ride (really long, like the length of a railroad track, long).
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
You criticize the White House for doing something we all do then you blame the wonderful effects of democracy on a web application?
I don't think very many of us are throwing around hundreds of billions in tax dollars trying to reduce unemployment in this country while at the same time outsourcing work that could be done here. But I suspect the problem has more to do with stupidity and lack of oversight than intent. DOL tried to contract with a US company, but that company is quietly trying to hire offshore programmers.
Re:Giant Deficits... (Score:3, Insightful)
decrease government spending in the first place.
Bingo! That's exactly what this initiative represents... Outsourcing to reduce government spending. In most government projects, salaries & benefits make up the largest percentage of the 'spending' - So if you want to reduce spending you cut labour costs.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
There are about 120 of them in the US here is a small list of some of those.
Colorado
Bent County Correctional Facility
Crowley County Correctional Facility
Kit Carson Correctional Center
Tennessee
Hardeman County Correctional Center
Whiteville Correctional Facility
Texas
Crystal City Correctional Center
Bartlett State Jail
Heck here is the list that CCA runs
http://www.correctionscorp.com/facilities/ [correctionscorp.com]
Or maybe next time you wonder why the sky is blue or 2 + 2 = 4, use google.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:1, Insightful)
Pot is not a gateway drug in the way that term is used, and you're talking out of your backside.
Yes, a small percentage of people who try pot may decide they're willing to try something harder. But, pot in and of itself does not cause you to continuously seek something with a stronger effect like heroin -- for which you'll never get as good an effect as the first time (and you can be hooked from the very first time). There's a lot of people who only use pot, and won't touch anything else.
Unfortunately, right now where it's unregulated, people will cut it with far more addictive substances. Instead of just getting herb, you could be getting meth mixed in as well.
Pot is not addictive in the classic sense of the word -- you don't really go through physical withdrawal if you don't have it. It's also not a "narcotic" as the anti-drug people claim -- except for chronic stoners in college, people don't become dependent on it physically. Pot also doesn't really have a fatal dose in that you can't OD on it and die (barring some allergic reaction or something).
I know more people who have used pot for an extended period of time (read: decades) and who have never tried anything more serious than I do those who went on to harder stuff. Most of those people continue to live meaningful lives and hold down jobs and careers without problems. The ones who did move on to harder stuff likely would have anyway due to personal circumstances.
I would argue, that you know nothing about pot. Which, is also true of most of the people who campaign against it.
The long term usage of pot is statistically less harmful than the long term effects of alcohol, or most things Pfizer sells us as medicine.
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree that it should be legalized (pursuit of happiness and all that) but I'm not so sure that I buy the "you can keep much better control over it" line. When I was a kid I had no problems getting my hands on booze or tobacco and both of those products are legal. We always knew which store we could go to that wouldn't card us, which 21+ sibling of a friend would make a straw purchase and whose parents were too lazy to lock up the liquor cabinet.
There's more than one definition of "better control over it". When was the last time you bought alcohol from the store which turned out to be antifreeze? How common is it for one liquor store owner to shoot the owner of the new liquor store which opened down the street because it encroached on his territory? These are both the sorts of things which used to happen during prohibition, and don't now for alcohol, but do for drugs.
Yep, but what about the PE? (Score:4, Insightful)
You are right. But, I think you missed a major point about the overall lack of professionalism among programmers.
I have an MSCS and have worked as a software engineer. My wife has a BSME. To graduate she had to pass the EIT. If she didn't pass the test she couldn't graduate. No matter that she earned honors at graduation. No EIT no degree. Ten years later she took and passed the Professional Engineer exam. She has a little stamp that lets her give the legal ability to approval designs. She is legally liable for what she approves. I didn't have to pass any kind of professional exam to get the job title "engineer". I have no little stamp. I can not approve designs.
What does tht mean? I can write software that is used to design a dam. Any programmer no mater what their training and experience could have been hired to write that software. Lets say my software as a bug that causes it to give wrong answers for very large dams (used float when I should have used long double...) OTOH, only a PE can legally design a dam. If my wife uses my software and the dam bursts she is legally responsible, but I am not. Why is that?
I used to work for a Canadian PE. He had this little steel ring. The steel was from a bridge that fell down. Canadian engineers are all given (and I believe they are required to wear) a ring made from the steel of that fallen bridge so that their responsibility is always in their minds. There are many examples of people dying from software bugs. The failure of the patriot missiles during the first gulf war and the hundred+ dead soldier that resulted from and idiot not knowing that there is no such thing as 0.1 (one tenth) in binary. Why aren't programmer required to carry around a bit of the combat boot taken from one of those dead soldiers? Or, at least a vial of sand from where they died?
There are no professional standards for programmers or so called software engineers. There is no code of conduct or ethics for programmers. From the point of view of real engineers we are just a bunch of amateurs being allowed to play with dangerous toys.
Stonewolf
Re:It's Worse Than You think! (Score:2, Insightful)
Save more money - Stop most of the ridiculous "war on drugs" and the exorbitant spending and manpower on the marijuana aspect of it.
While in general I agree with you, I doubt much would be saved by eliminating marijuana from the 'War on Drugs'. The reason is that most of those activities would exist anyway. Border crossings would still be checked for other drugs, or are you saying we should legalize cocaine and heroin too? And if not for drugs, they'd still be searching for explosives.
Locally, they might be able to reduce some of their activities; such as flying over fields and forests looking for pot plantations, the gain wouldn't be large because they would still be out looking for meth.
I'd much rather have pot legal than alcohol. The worst collateral damage I've seen from pot is a contact high. OTOH, I have childhood friends who were killed by drunk drivers.
Re:Good job? But he's wrong! (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong problem. (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you are looking at the wrong problem. The problem is our standard of living. We want to have more leisure time and/or more control of our working conditions. We need better health-care and education and secure place to live without working to death in order to earn it.
We DON't need to be competing with foreign workers. You mentioned Jim Crow. It's a racist jingoism that has convinced Americans that they deserve to profit off of the wages of those in the developing world. We can have a better standard of living when we realize that the Indian programmer has the same interests that we do, and that the Indian's boss and our boss have more in common with each other than with us.
You mentioned the high cost of taxes and of commuting. We need to start living in cities again. Suburban sprawl has cost us both in commuting costs and by atomizing us and keeping us from having a real community. It's simply more efficient to live near more people. With a real community, we wouldn't need the state to provide services. With real community, we wouldn't be duped into funding the terror war and the drug war. The suburbs tend to be the more reactionary conservative parts of the nation, while the urban areas are the more progressive.
You mentioned the labor movement. Real democratic radical unions are the only way workers can gain more power. Imagine if both you and the workers in the developing world were in the same union. International solidarity could prevent corporations from constantly moving production to whichever nation has the worst labor and human rights records. We need democratic accountable unions. Not the AFL/CIO or SEIU or the Teamsters. We need unions like the UE [ueunion.org] and the IWW [iww.org].
The ultimate goal should be workers self management of all industry. Wall Street speculators and bosses are in it to make money for themselves in the short term, while workers interests are in creating sustainable jobs with good wages, benefits, and working conditions.
Re:Good job? But he's wrong! (Score:1, Insightful)
How on earth can you call Taiwan a 3rd world country? Taiwan is a wonderful country with often better infrastructure than the USA!
Re:Yep, but what about the PE? (Score:1, Insightful)
>>When the Patriot system was first designed, the primary targets were Soviet aircraft and cruise missiles
>>travelling at speeds around MACH 2, and only operating at a few hours at a time.
>>The software used had been written in assembly language 20 years ago. When Patriot systems were
>>brought into the Gulf conflict, the software was modified (several times) to cope with the high speed of
>>ballistic missiles, for which the system was not originally designed.
>>This calculation was needed in about half a dozen places in the program, but the call to the subroutine was
>>not inserted at every point where it was needed.
So, you take a system which was written 20 years prior to the event in assembly which was not designed to deal with the speed that ballistic missles traveled at 20 years later, and poorly patch it.
Somehow this is because some idiot doesnt know that there is no such thing as .1 in binary? I think not. You are simply ill informed - most likely repeating whatever you heard and not reading enough of what was posted on Slashdot.
Its clear that they operated fine under the ORIGINAL DESIGN SPECS, and that the original designer most likely was aware of this, but that it was irrelevant because the conditions required for this to be relevant didnt exist (slow ballistic missles + temp deployment).