Re: someone noticed 90 percent indians posting on asktom.oracle.com

On 11 Aug 2003 19:57:17 GMT, Uncle Sam <patriots_at_unite.com> wrote:

> "Maximus" <qweqwe_at_qwqwewq.com> wrote in
> news:2dSZa.701670$3C2.16457897_at_news3.calgary.shaw.ca:
>
>> "Tanel Poder" <change_to_my_first_name_at_integrid.info> wrote in message
>> news:3f37ec83_1_at_news.estpak.ee...
>>> > in these state of it-business I will not answer any questions here,
>>> because
>>> > it could be from the cheap guy
>>> > getting my job, i will only care if I see an interesting question
>>>
>>> Heh-heh, you just have to be good enough, to make employers not care
>>> about your price very much...
>>
>> Yeah, what is it about a little competition that gets people shaking
>> in thier boots. If you don't wnt to get replaced, you just have to be
>> better. It's the free-market capitalist way... lol.
>>
>>
>>
>
> Yeah but for the avg cost of a DBA in the USA, companies can hire 10 from
> India or Russia. They may or may not be as good but even 10 mediocre DBAs
> can probably get a lot more done than 1 excellent one.

10 crap DBAs are certainly likely to get a whole lot more done than 1 good one. Including wiping all my data, tuning things dreadfully, and generally stuffing things up. Point being, India and Russia aren't the obvious choice for DBAing, unless they're good at it. "Cheap" doesn't mean inevitably that the work will flow there, otherwise you'd find Botswana somewhere near the top of the industrial production league tables. There have been quite a number of posts here lately moaning about 'cheap' Indians, or sort-of suggesting that Indians/Russians/Whatever aren't really quite as good as a 'proper' DBA... the same sort of argument, incidentally, that had those nice people on the streets of Seattle not too many years ago, though tinged I notice in this case with a nice hint of racism.

Have you not heard of the law of comparative advantage? Namely, work goes to where it can best be done for least cost. Adam Smith wrote about it about 200 years ago. If India and Russia are doing so well in the DBA sphere these days, its because they have a comparative advantage in doing it, only one factor of which may be low cost. And that means you have to work harder and better to compete, and be prepared to shift your ground to concentrate on those things where *you* have a comparative advantage.

One would have thought that the lesson would have been learnt by now, given that such shifts have happened many times in the manufacturing industry (Manchester still producing cotton goods these days? Norton bikes are the market leader? Where did your last RAM chip get made?) over the past 200 years. Service industries are not immune, and why should they be?

But you don't react to it by getting racist, just by getting smarter. Web deployment, anyone?

~QM Received on Mon Aug 11 2003 - 17:25:16 CDT