Indian labor leaders touring the United States found American workers disgruntled but willing to listen on issues relating to job outsourcing to India.
Union members representing the New Trade Union Initiative, an organization of independent unions, along with the Washington-based Jobs With Justice, are halfway through a 15-day tour of various cities in this country, trying to convince the angry American worker why her or his job was leaving the country.
“We got a much better idea of how outsourcing is dislocating families and employees here,” said Ashim Roy, president of several unions representing General Electric workers in Gujarat. In an interview with News India-Times, he said the group of Indian labor leaders, who had so far visited New York, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, and Erie, PA, met with various union representatives including Service Employees International Union, Communications Workers of America, United Electrical Workers, as well as the AFL-CIO. The group is proceeding to Seattle, Portland, Washington D.C., and Atlanta.
“But we have also tried to convey to our working brothers here that there are issues beyond just jobs going from here. When jobs go from here to India, China or the Philippines, they go places where there are no labor standards, where workers don’t have the capacity to raise wages, because they don’t have the ability to organize. If they did, outsourcing would still take place, but it would be in manner that would allow for better adjustment,” Roy said.
He also noted the differing working conditions in both countries. “An average worker here may work 40 hours where in India he or she works 60 hours. An Indian worker is given only one minute to answer a call, as opposed to five minutes to an American call center worker. And the fact is this can’t be changed. This is the very important component of why jobs are going to India,” Roy emphasized.
Along with outsourcing, there is also downsizing. “The process is not that the Indian worker is taking away a job, but rather a classic example of a job being lost – so three workers are fighting for one job. Jobs in general are going down,” he contended. “So, if you look at it as ‘my job’ and ‘your job’, then you cannot reach a reconciliation. But if you look at it as an issue of rights of workers, then there could be a meeting point on labor standards.”
V. Chandra, a woman who has worked in the coal industry for 25 years and is the organizing secretary of a union representing 50,000 miners, told News India-Times, “We have met a lot of rank and file workers, and many of the people are very emotional that Indian workers have stolen jobs from American workers.”
But Chandra said that she and others in her group have tried to convince them of the global economy’s workings and “how the corporate sector systematically wants to divide us. We have no direct role in the outsourcing to India. It is the very poor, unemployed that take this undignified work in call centers. Global regulations can be done through international labor organizations, have a dialogue and put forward demands. It is a long-term struggle, but it will work eventually,” she said , adding, “Many here are now convinced that it is not the Indian worker that has stolen the job.”
Anannya Bhattacharjee, international program coordinator for Jobs With Justice, said the tour had gone well so far. “Our goal for beginning this binational collaboration is to build relations at a time when India and this economy is very much discussed and visible in U.S. politics. Most American workers know and talk about India at this time, though most people have not met or talked to any Indian workers. Most of the news was being filtered through companies like Wipro, an information technology giant, or politicians. We felt it should happen through workers and in a positive way rather than through negative stereotyping.”
Calling it a historic tour, Bhattacharjee contended, “[American] people should know from Indian workers how they feel about outsourcing and see how they can work together on outsourcing.” According to her, the interactions have been very open and positive in the many meetings that have taken place. “It has been a reasonable discussion, even when we have met workers who have lost their jobs and are very angry. We come out of the meeting with the knowledge that it is not the workers that control the jobs, but rather the corporations who are engaged in this race to the bottom.”
“It’s a question of building new strategies,” said Roy. “Why not build a global framework of contracting. We have had a good response to this. There is a United Nations group looking into this, as is ILO,” said Roy.
The group is visiting nine cities seeking dialogue with U.S. workers about mutual interests.
Jobs With Justice says it is a network of over 40 local workers’ rights coalitions in the United States that connects labor, faith-based, community, and student organizations to work together for social and economic justice.
