Hollywood and the Heartland Join Together In Campaign against Outsourcing of American Jobs: Actor Ja

Washington, D.C. – A unique Hollywood-heartland partnership is focusing attention on the issue of outsourcing and the threat it poses to America's economic future by launching OutsourceOutrage.com, a new web resource site to protect good U.S. jobs.

The site features an exclusive Internet short film-"Outsource This!"-starring TV's Jason Alexander, along with facts about job outsourcing, case studies, and ways to take action.

"The outsourcing of American manufacturing and technical jobs has become 'business as usual' over the past few years," Alexander said. "In my own industry, we must constantly fight the trend of taking American film work out of the United States. Canada, Prague, Budapest. These places are now appearing on film as America. Why? Because of tax incentives and labor incentives given by these countries to lure jobs away from American workers. Men and women that I have known for over 20 years, craftspeople and technicians, camera operators and production managers, have all seen their livelihoods disappear due to this devastating trend."

"Our film satire, while done for humor, accurately depicts the situation. To claim the creation of jobs while knowing full well those jobs have been created for American firms in foreign countries is a horrific lie. And unlike our film it's not particularly funny," Alexander said.

According to the Department of Labor, 2.7 million manufacturing jobs have disappeared in the last three years alone as U.S. corporations move operations overseas to chase rock-bottom wages and sub-standard working conditions. Now, from Silicon Valley to hardhit manufacturing states like Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, outsourcing threatens jobs in a growing range of sectors-computer programming, tech support, customer call centers, banking, insurance, health care and others. The University of California Berkeley estimates that as many as 14 million of America's high-tech and white-collar jobs are at risk over the next few years.

"The Information Age was supposed to usher in a new economy with well-paying technical jobs to replace our crumbling manufacturing base," said Morton Bahr, president of the Communications Workers of America, which represents more than 700,000 workers in telecom, high tech, news media, manufacturing, airlines and other fields. "Now those jobs of the future are disappearing. Skilled American workers are training their replacements from India and the Philippines, and this administration is actually encouraging companies to outsource."

Jason Alexander believes outsourcing ought to be a major issue in this fall's elections. "Our economy, our sociology and our future depend on the constant and ever improving use of our work-force. Those that divert opportunity from Americans to foreign workers in order to maximize profits are robbing this economy and this nation. We must build the incentives to stop this crisis. Otherwise, these non-patriots will bleed away the future of America," he said.

"Outsource This!" was produced by filmmaker and progressive media strategist Julie Bergman Sender and Oscar Nominated filmmaker Stuart Sender of Balcony Films. Ken Olin, executive producer of ABC Television's "Alias," directed it.

Facts on Outsourcing

Wages negatively impacted – Despite significant gains in worker productivity, 80 percent of working families have seen a drop in real wages in the last year as a result of outsourcing. Displaced workers find jobs paying wages an average of 13 percent lower than their previous position. IT workers were paid up to 23 percent less in 2003 than in 2001.

Threats to security and privacy – Because American privacy laws and security measures do not extend beyond our borders, our personal security could be at risk as a result of outsourcing jobs.

• Pakistani and Indian workers, hired to perform medical transcription, have extorted money from U.S. companies by threatening to post private medical records on the Internet.
  
• California has outsourced design plans for the state's electrical grid to workers in Thailand-a process that security experts have long warned against.
  
• Pennsylvania law enforcement agencies are using foreign workers to code police records.
  

Government agencies are outsourcing American jobs – As many as 41 states are outsourcing work services related to the electronic benefits transfer (EBT) system-including food stamps and unemployment benefits. Having Americans perform these jobs, rather than foreign workers, could help re-employ the unemployed. In 2003, states outsourced $10 billion of information technology services jobs; this is projected to grow to $23 billion by 2008.

Solutions – Congress must pass new laws empowering Americans to demand service from U.S.-based workers:

• The federal "Consumers' Right to Know Act" would require all customer service call-takers to identify themselves and their location. If they were speaking with a foreign-based operator, consumers could demand to be sent to an operator working in the U.S.
  
• We must eliminate the tax breaks that encourage companies to move jobs overseas.
  
• Workers who have lost their information technology jobs should also be eligible for trade adjustment assistance. Currently they are not covered.
  
• More than 30 states have introduced legislation to ban overseas work by state contractors to protect jobs and strengthen cities and communities in their states.
  
• We must pass privacy laws to set standards for transmission of financial and medical information to protect the public.
  

To watch Jason's Alexander's "Outsource This!" video, visit: www.OutsourceOutrage.com.