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Has the decline of knowledge work begun?

(www.nytimes.com)
388 points pseudolus | 1 comments | 25 Mar 25 17:02 UTC | HN request time: 0.21s | source
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ferguess_k ◴[27 Mar 25 14:16 UTC] No.43493912[source]▶
What I worry a lot more instead is how knowledge of manufacturing and engineering could be lost due to our greed.

Typical scenario: Industry I is not doing fine in country C (i.e. the fund managers are not happy about lack of growth of the public companies in this sector) due to reasons R1, R2, ..., Rn. Then management decided to outsource and eventually dismantle the factories to "globalize" it. Knowledge retained by the older generation of engineers, technicians and workers were completely lost when they passed away.

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al_borland ◴[27 Mar 25 14:42 UTC] No.43494174[source]▶
I think about this often and it bothers me a lot.

I think the same can happen for knowledge work. Country A ends up turning into a bunch of managers outsourcing to Country B, and then at some point Country B realizes they can manage themselves. Companies are quite literally training their future competition. Once it reaches a tipping point, I don’t think it’s easy to reverse.

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pca006132 ◴[27 Mar 25 14:59 UTC] No.43494357[source]▶
I feel like top management and share holders don't really care about things that may happen ~30 years later. And even if they care, there are a lot more other issues that may ruin a company, e.g. the entire industry is replaced due to technological advancement.
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1. al_borland ◴[28 Mar 25 00:49 UTC] No.43500080[source]▶
It's not necessarily the fault of the company. The government created the environment to make it the only way to stay competitive for a lot of companies. Some bucked the trend, and I respect them for it. There is a push to bring things back now, but it's going to be ugly. It's much better to avoid the issue in the first place like most countries, but it's too late for that.