The West Outsources More and More IT Jobs to Eastern Europe
More and more IT jobs and services are being outsourced to countries in Eastern Europe. Companies from Western Europe and other nations have found out labor in Eastern Bloc countries is not only cheaper but workers are highly qualified .
IT outsourcing has brought central and eastern Europe about $4 billion in the last year. Western European companies are eager to cut costs. German companies like Deutsche Bank and Siemens are sending more and more work to Eastern Europe. Adding to this, these countries are training young people to become IT workers and teaching them how to apply for jobs in the west.
Many services, from bookkeeping and data processing to software development are offered by new IT companies.
Not only Western European countries, but the USA has also found out that IT specialists from Eastern Bloc countries are as qualified as specialists from Asia. The United States has been turning mainly to India for IT help but is more often outsourcing services to Eastern Europe. Last summer, Morgan Stanley, an American bank, announced that it was opening up a business center with 200 employees in Budapest, Hungary.
American and Western Europeans hope that by outsourcing work to Eastern Europe they can get into the profitable Eastern Europe market more quickly. Governments help to attract western firms by giving them tax breaks .
Union leaders, especially in Europe are skeptical about outsourcing. Although it is not a problem yet European companies may be facing an employment problem in the IT sector in the next ten to twenty years.
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Words
- although = while
- announce = to say officially
- apply = to ask for permission to have a job
- attract = to pull towards
- data processing = the use of computers to organize information and store it
- eager = want to do something fast
- Eastern Bloc = the countries in eastern Europe that were once Communist
- employee = a person who works in a company
- especially = above all
- face = look at; to be confronted with
- IT = information technology
- labor = work
- outsource = when a company uses workers from somewhere else to do a job
- profitable = money-making
- service = work that you do for someone else
- software development = to create and write computer programs
- tax break = you do not have to pay so many taxes
- union = organization of workers to protect their rights