(no subject)

Factory and assembly jobs have long been moving overseas from the United States; consumers are accustomed to having their basketball shoes stitched up in Indonesia or Vietnam and their electronics and automobiles roll off lines in Singapore, Malaysia and Mexico. But HLW's operations in Shanghai are an example of how technology is tying together more sophisticated pieces of the global production chain, allowing even highly skilled work that once seemed inextricably linked to a particular place to be shipped out to lower-cost lands.

The white-collar work is expanding beyond the customer-service call centers that many U.S. companies have moved to developing countries. In India, for example, radiologists now interpret CT scans for hospitals in the United States, and accountants assess risks on loan applications for homes halfway around the globe. U.S. architectural work is being farmed out to the Philippines, Poland and India, as well as China. Microsoft Corp. operates a sophisticated computer research center in Beijing. By 2015, according to a report by Forrester Research Inc., more than 3 million white-collar jobs and nearly $140 billion in wages will have shifted from the United States to other nations.

from "White-Collar Work A Booming U.S. Export: Specialized Jobs Farmed Out to China, Other Nations" By Peter S. Goodman, Washington Post Foreign Service; Wednesday, April 2, 2003; Page E01.

(no subject)

So, my previous employer in Louisiana has refused to respond to several requests for reference information about me -- jeapordizing my present temp job. They're not saying anything bad about me, just not saying anything at all.

This leaves me in a very bad position, because my employer before that doesn't exist anymore. There are no professional references I can give at this point.

How can I find out what legal recourse I have against my former employer? I could talk to a lawyer, but I can't prove that there have been any damages. Unless I lose my present job, I guess...