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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday June 10 2020, @08:12PM   Printer-friendly
from the let-me-count-the-ways dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

The arrival of the novel coronavirus and subsequent shutdowns of economies across the globe have caused hardships not seen in generations. But for business professors, it's also a once-in-a-generation research opportunity.

USC Marshall Assistant Professor of Marketing and Kenneth King Stonier Assistant Professor of Business Administration Davide Proserpio was one of the first academics to study the sharing economy as he completed his Ph.D. Today he is considered a leading expert in the so-called "gig" economy. We asked him five questions about how the COVID-19 pandemic and resultant shutdown are affecting the sector.


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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 11 2020, @07:07AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 11 2020, @07:07AM (#1006200)

    Those in more expensive "first world" countries should beware though. With more bosses and companies confirming that employees working from home isn't that bad for productivity, many of them may decide to have significantly cheaper employees working from other countries instead.

    Minimum annual wage in USA: $15,080

    Compare with:
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/vietnam [averagesalarysurvey.com]
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/philippines [averagesalarysurvey.com]
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/india [averagesalarysurvey.com]
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/malaysia [averagesalarysurvey.com]

    They won't be the best. But plenty will be better than what you can get in the USA for $15,080.

    US cops aren't significantly better than cops in much cheaper countries (might even be worse) and cost more. Wouldn't be a stretch to say that many mid or lower end US employees would similarly not be significantly better than cheaper workers in other countries.

    See also:
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/united-states [averagesalarysurvey.com]
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/australia [averagesalarysurvey.com]

    https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/01/16/169528579/outsourced-employee-sends-own-job-to-china-surfs-web [npr.org]

    And it turns out that the job done in China was above par — the employee's "code was clean, well written, and submitted in a timely fashion. Quarter after quarter, his performance review noted him as the best developer in the building,"

    it looked like he earned several hundred thousand dollars a year, and only had to pay the Chinese consulting firm about fifty grand annually

    And that consulting firm might have paid less to the developer(s) doing the actual work.
    https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/china [averagesalarysurvey.com]

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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday June 11 2020, @01:19PM (2 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday June 11 2020, @01:19PM (#1006271) Journal

    Those in more expensive "first world" countries should beware though. With more bosses and companies confirming that employees working from home isn't that bad for productivity, many of them may decide to have significantly cheaper employees working from other countries instead.

    That ship started sailing half a century ago. If they haven't done so by now, indicates that there was some advantage to employing people in the developed world. That advantage isn't going away just because of coronavirus. Further, that pay differential is much lower now than it was way back when. Having a mean salary higher than the US's minimum wage (which all four of your linked countries do) is a very new thing. The world is running out of cheap labor.

    US cops aren't significantly better than cops in much cheaper countries (might even be worse) and cost more. Wouldn't be a stretch to say that many mid or lower end US employees would similarly not be significantly better than cheaper workers in other countries.

    Great non sequitur. Those other mid or lower end US employees whose jobs could actually be moved somewhere aren't a lot of things when they aren't cops. They aren't government jobs. They aren't heavily unionized jobs. And they usually aren't jobs where performance and task outcome are routinely ignored. For example of the last part, consider the usual outcome of a cop killing someone unlawfully: put on leave, sometimes disciplined, and rarely tried for a crime - it's more important to protect the cop than to correct bad performance. Or how weakly the police will try to recovery your stuff when someone steals it - it isn't important to them whether you recover from the crime or not.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 12 2020, @02:58AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 12 2020, @02:58AM (#1006744)

      That ship started sailing half a century ago. If they haven't done so by now, indicates that there was some advantage to employing people in the developed world.

      Guess you're one of those developed world workers who aren't smart enough to realize that's a different ship.

      For years many people who could work from home weren't allowed to by their employers/bosses. If that ship really did sail, they would have been working from home already!

      Now that has changed. Significantly more employers are saying many/all of their employees can continue to work from home indefinitely.

      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 12 2020, @01:44PM

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday June 12 2020, @01:44PM (#1006855) Journal

        Now that has changed.

        For a few months. There's no reason to expect it to stick around after the emergency is over.