In his article "Offshoring: The Next Industrial Revolution," Alan S. Blinder posits that it is not necessarily the low-skilled jobs that will be offshored in the future. He predicts that jobs that can be done by means of communication technology anywhere in the world are more likely to be offshored from the developed countries to the developing countries than service-sector jobs that must be (or preferably are) done face-to-face. He does not think that the exponential increase in offshoring is, in and of itself, a problem for developed countries, such as the U.S., rather he thinks that how developing countries choose to manage it (or not manage/ignore it) will cause problems for their domestic economies, and the international economy as a whole.
Blinder emphasizes the importance of reforming the American educational system to proactively prepare for future offshoring. He believes the solution is not necessarily more education; some of the face-to-face jobs that he predicts will stay in the U.S. are low-skilled jobs, such as taxi driving, cleaning, and crane operating. He states, "In the future, how children are educated may prove to be more important than how much" (Blinder 125). I think this intriguing statement requires further discussion.
As a student at a liberal arts college, I have at times questioned the practical application of some of more theoretical classes that I have taken. When I talk with some of my friends from high school who have already completed technical/vocational school for their area of interest and have started working full time at jobs that they love, I sometimes wonder whether a significant number of students at 4-year universities are wrongly advised to get their Bachelor's Degree.
This idea is the premise behind the "UnCollege" movement: http://www.uncollege.org/manifesto/. The members of this group argue that many self-motivated individuals are actually held back from truly furthering their education when they enter the university setting. Instead, they believe that many young people would be better off using the money that they would spend getting a degree to start their own businesses. This entrepreneurial spirit would no doubt help America's economy.
More education is not necessarily better. Not only is the cost of education in America inflated, (one of my friends is considering the possibility of attending graduate school in Zurich, Switzerland because it is approximately $1000 per year... Though education in Switzerland is highly subsidized, there has to be some middle ground between highly inflated and highly subsidized education...) it is sometimes wasted. Because the American joblessness rate is so high, many college graduates simply enroll in graduate school or law school to bide their time before entering the job market. This phenomenon is no doubt contributing to the high job dissatisfaction rate among lawyers.
I think Blinder would agree that their should be more than one "conventional" track for education. People have different skills and abilities, and as such, their should be different educational programs with varying curricula and durations. If this more practical educational atmosphere is actualized, America will have a more efficient transition into the third Industrial Revolution--that involving information technology and offshoring--that Blinder predicts will happen.
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