Study: Outsourcing could hit jobs in some metro areas

15.02.2007
Offshoring may eliminate as many as one in five programming, software engineering and back office jobs such as data-key entry during the next several years in certain metropolitan areas where employment in those fields is the heaviest, according to a study by The Brookings Institution released this week.

Brookings, a Washington-based think tank, has attempted to put job loss numbers around one of the most worrisome issues for IT workers today, while also recommending steps the government can take to slow the trend.

Where this report, The Implications of Service Offshoring for Metropolitan Economies, differs from others that have tried to assess the implications of offshoring is its analysis of how the trend will affect metro areas with high concentrations of IT-related jobs.

Overall, Brookings found that 28 metropolitan areas with 13.5 percent of the nation's population are likely to lose between 2.6 percent and 4.3 percent of their jobs to service offshoring. Those metro areas that could see the highest job losses, above 3.1 percent,, are Boulder, Col.; Lowell, Mass.; San Francisco; San Jose; and Stamford, Conn.

Several other cities, including New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, could lose between 2.1 percent to 2.5 percent of their service jobs.

Among the areas where workers could fare better are Las Vegas and Riverside, Calif. These two metropolitan areas with more than 1 million people are likely to see no more than than 1.5 percent of their jobs moved offshore. Indeed, in particular is in need of IT workers.