U.S. losing edge in higher education, skills

Wouldn't you know it? Just when we thought education and higher skills would be the answer to maintaining our standard of living, it is now being "outsourced" to other countries.

There will be those who will want to close the borders, "circle the wagons" and come up with "bumper-sticker" solutions — enact tougher tariffs and blame other nations for our problems. Our greatest danger is not the competition from other nations, rather the self-congratulation we indulge in while making cosmetic adjustments to an educational system that was designed for an industrial era.

America's position as an economic world leader is no longer a given. In 1990, the National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE) issued a sobering report, "America's Choice: High Skills or Low Wages." It pointed out that: while 30 percent of Americans may do well for a while, 70 percent would see their dreams slip away; our nation was not investing in educational and training systems necessary for developing the higher skilled work force needed to compete in the global economy; and, by default, America was choosing low wages over high skills.

The report, at that time, found that the new economy required higher-skilled workers, but our educational system was not producing them. It called for restructuring education so it could prepare students to make a transition from school to work to promote high skills. It concluded that, with a higher skilled work force, America would be able to maintain its competitive edge. It became the genesis of the Goals 2000 Educate America Act, the School to Work Investment Act and the No Child Left Behind Act.

Now, 14 years later, the global economy has, once again, made a quantum leap forward. The creation of the Web gave new impetus to globalization. NCEE is now finding that higher skills are not enough. Ray Uhalde, co-director at NCEE, has pointed out that "U.S. job growth has declined, and we now have become more reliant on immigration labor (and). . . . Globalization . . . developed at warp speed spurred by microprocessor-computer technologies." Many of these changes were largely unforeseen in 1990.

U.S. companies are now "outsourcing" work to other countries that have high skilled workers but pay low wages. According to Uhalde, studies project U.S. companies will be sending 3.3 million service sector jobs overseas by 2015, and that, "10 percent of IT jobs in American firms and 5 percent of non IT companies will be outsourced offshore by the end of 2004."