I find the recent panic of (mainly) US hi-tech workers about "offshoring" (outsourcing of programmer/engineer work) to India, China, Russia etc, a bit unjustified and premature.

It's funny how people like to panic and over-exaggerate any event. When you read what people write in blogs and articles, you see the belief is that soon no development will be done in US and the Western world, it will all move to the East.

What people fail to understand that there are economic forces in the world, which can't be tricked. Suppose all, or most, engineers in US lose their jobs to India. The buying power of the US will cripple, as a lot of people will be out of jobs or move to low-paying jobs. So, to whom exactly will these Indians sell ? The financial powers of produce-consume balance out, the tragedies these people refer to just can't happen.

Why not look at the bright side of this. Huge economies - China and India have more than 2 billion people living there, will rise, consuming goods and demanding high-tech products. It's a demand a few times larger than the current one. Their economic situation will improve, consumption improve, and eventually salaries of high-tech will level out, or almost level out, which will make outsourcing impractical. The order of magnitude difference won't last long.

I think that in general what's happening is good. The economy is recovering quickly now, and it will only be fueled to recover further by the fast improvement of the eastern markets. There are hundreds of millions of people there who don't have computers, laptops, cellphones, and other gadgets.