Not Indians, but globalisation taking US jobs
The United States’ recent concerns that Indians are chasing jobs of the country's middle class, are not entirely true. During the US presidential poll campaign, Republican candidate Donald Trump tried hard to assuage the country's working class population that he would bring back jobs to all of them. However, it has been generally observed that skilled Indians, those who are armed with top class engineering, management and medical degrees, either from home or from the US, normally stake claim to really high-profile jobs.
Thus, ordinary graduates passing out with science, technology, engineering and mathematics degrees from middle-and-working-class families in America, hardly come in competition with the highly skilled Indians, migrating to that country. It is a fact that the lower and the middle class Americans have been losing jobs in the last two decades as a result of massive waves of globalisation. This was mainly because of outsourcing of back-end jobs of major industries in the field of manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, automobiles and a host of financial services, to developing nations like India, China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Sri lanka etc. These and many less developing countries, offer the giant US multi-national corporations (MNCs) readily available cheap labour, low maintenance and operational costs; and opportunities to reach out to new markets. Therefore, the net margin of profit, earned by the MNCs, are certainly huge. To that extent, the cause of concern displayed by middle class Americans is valid.
The promise Trump made to his countrymen, assuring more jobs to the middle class, is absolutely fine. But the kind of perceptions that floated in some pockets of that country, about Indians driving deep into the job markets, must be judged cautiously. Over the years, the size of the American middle class has shrunk from 71 per cent in 1971 to 49 per cent today, as revealed by Pew Research Centre recently. But what is less commonly known is that more people are moving up the ladder than down in the US. Worryingly, those most likely to fall to the lower ladder in society, are with only a high school degree or dropouts from schools. Some economists in America say that manufacturing was once a field from which the middle class could aspire to climb the social ladder.
But, today it is not so. At the centre of the debate are not the Indians or any other migrant group, that are stealing the jobs from the Americans. It is globalised trade that has made many locals lose their livelihood around the world. But the mounting rise of international trade has also contributed to the creation of millions of jobs which, in turn, has lifted many from poverty. What Bernie Sanders, a Democratic presidential contender, and Trump, agreed during the election campaign, was that trade was killing the ‘American Dream'. Even the revolution in technological change, is another potential factor. Not the Indians.