8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Barely can be Considered Book about Outsourcing, January 17, 2006
This review is from: Bringing the Jobs Home: How the Left Created the Outsourcing Crisis--and How We Can Fix It (Hardcover)
When I picked up this book I thought it would offer me two things. I thought it would be about outsourcing and it would provide solutions to the problems. Sadly, Buchholz's book did neither. Instead, it provided many critiques from an American capitalist's point of view about society. In that regard it did a satisfactory job, although there are many popular books that did a far better job of doing it (Sowell's Basic Economics and even Stossel's Give me a Break).
The first 20 pages of the book offered hope that it'd stay on the topic of outsourcing; however even they were disappointing. There were few facts supporting free trade or details about why outsourcing can help an economy. After the first chapter Buchholz quickly veers off outsourcing and into taxes, education, tort reform and many other faults within our society. In doing this though he rarely talks about how they relate to outsourcing. This book is especially lacking in any quantitative analysis. Many of these facts are seen as given and therefore don't require support. Finally, his last chapter on our cultural exports seemed to be a socially conservative polemic that was out of place in an otherwise economically focused book. If you are looking for a book about outsourcing or an above introductory look at economic problems in the United States, I'd look elsewhere. Buchholz's book is strictly for those who haven't read alot about modern American politics and are looking for a partisan introduction to them.
The main positive about this book is it's an easy and quick read. At 179 pages you won't waste too much time on it. The author does a very good job at making the book flow. He adds many pop culture references, although they seem forced at times. Because of the very fluid writing style and his obvious intelligence, I might give his other books a chance. But hopefully they'll be a little better content wise than this one.
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8 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
useful, June 2, 2005
This review is from: Bringing the Jobs Home: How the Left Created the Outsourcing Crisis--and How We Can Fix It (Hardcover)
Outsourcing is a hugely controversial (and inconveniently complex) issue these days, but with the aid of Buchholz's book you'll acquire sea legs enough to be able to hold your own in most non-specialized discussions on the subject.
Is outsourcing good or bad for America? It's quite obviously bad for America in the short run, but will it make us more efficient in the long run, as Schumpeter's theories of "creative destruction" suggest? It's nice to have a discussion of these matters by an accomplished and articulate economist.
Buchholz lays out the reasons he believes the outsourcing blight has hit us, and, honestly, it's hard to disagree with him. The major culprits? Our educational system does not produce competitive workers, our immigration laws "chase away talent," our tax laws encourage outsourcing, etc.
I do disagree with him on one point: I, like virtually everybody else, think our educational system sucks, but I don't see that as being a chief cause of outsourcing, so I wonder how clearly Buchholz has thought through the matter.
I mean, the reason all those companies are hiring subcontinentals to do their computer programming for them is simply because it's cheaper. The U.S. education system could be ten times better than it is, and this would still be happening. 100% of our high-school and college graduates could be masters of math, history, physics, programming, etc., and companies would still be hiring offshore workers because all they need is employees who can program C++ cheaper and broadband internet has now made it feasible to go halfway across the world to get them.
Not that overhauling the education system wouldn't be a step in the right direction: it definitely makes our workers less competitive. I'm not as convinced as Buchholz is that this would reverse the outsourcing murrain.
One other complaint: I was hoping Buchholz, with his indisputable background in macroeconomics, would say something (offer a prediction?) about the relative benefits of outsourcing in the light of Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage, which suggests that disasters of this sort can actually be blessings in disguise. Alas! No clear position was ever given.
In any case it is a swift and informative read.
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Rubbish, December 29, 2008
This review is from: Bringing the Jobs Home: How the Left Created the Outsourcing Crisis--and How We Can Fix It (Hardcover)
With a world market available, and a world labor pool available, there will be a decline in wages and standard of living in the US. Not much can change that - even protectionism and whining. Throw out the neocons that have exacerbated this mess by their love of deregulated markets. Was there a foreword to this book by George W Bush?
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