Lets take a look at outsourcing from a global perspective.

I have outsourced work and now provide outsourcing services.

Why? I have seen a need in the market for high quaility work done at competitive price, more so when the economy is down. It would be a strategic blunder for any corporation today not to consider outsourcing as a strategic initiative to prosper & even survive in today's marketplace.

Having said that lets look at the other side of the coin.

I have recently seen a cry that - wait these people from Russia, India and China are taking our jobs, lets stop them!

Interestingly the same cry was and still is heard from small businesses in India, China, Brazil and other economically dis-advantaged (polite term for economically poorer) countries when corporations from USA were capturing and are still capturing the market in those countries. And they wanted the government to stop them, which didn't happen as they would have liked due to external constraints like pressure from the US government, GATT etc. So today we have pepsi & coke & domino's in every street corner, whereas many local brands have all but dis-appeared! And my little niece likes best a Pizza ("Pizaa", as she says it with an eye of love) from Dominos.

Either they are both wrong or they both right! These are all artifacts of globalization.

Either you create a closed society where US doesn't do any trade outside the country and US corporations has no business interests outside the country in which case you can also close your doors to outsourcing options. Or you vote for opening the barriers to business everywhere which means US business thrive outside the country also and non-US business do the same inside US too. And in the global free market the best & most affordable alternatives win.

This cannot be a one-sided coin. The corporations in an open economic climate will go for options that better their chance of success.

The best response to the challenge would be to optimize your process so you can effectively compete with the outsourcing options and/or leverage the outsourcing options yourself to position your business for success. Do a SWOT analysis and you will immediately realize several key strengths to small US businesses and individuals enjoyed due to geographical proximity and others due to past experience & skills.
Re-orient the business strategy to that effect and you will see that outsourcing is a boon not to just corporations but small businesses and individuals.

Very soon you will see that a state of equilibrium has been reached where the total cost of outsourcing will be approximately equal to insourcing. As Japanese car makers did not wipe out the US car makers, rather they became more efficient and stronger, expect as similar phenomena to happen here too.

What are your thoughts on this?