Globalization of Services: Friend or Foe?

Abstract

Globalization of services is underway: Is it to be welcomed or despised? What is at the root of the changes sweeping through the white-collar workforce in the United States, and to a lesser extent abroad as well? What might be the implications for metrics of economic performance, such as productivity growth, income, and employment? More broadly, this new globalization of business and professional services as enabled by networked information technology (IT) features dramatic change for workers, businesses, and policymakers. Businesses are already implementing change by altering what activities and jobs they expand in the United States and which ones they expand abroad. Workers must respond to these rapid changes, and they are responding. Is there also a rationale for policymakers to change?