AT&T Wants All That and a Box of Chocolate

Last week, AT&T’s CEO lamented his company’s inability to find enough skilled workers to fill the 5,000 jobs he promised to repatriate from India. The chief executive, Randall Stephenson, reportedly said he “is especially distressed that in some U.S. communities and among certain groups, the high school dropout rate is as high as 50 percent.”

He then attempts to validate his concern saying, “If I had a business that half the product we turned out was defective or you couldn’t put into the marketplace, I would shut that business down.”

Hmmmm. High school dropouts are defective products? That’s a bold, bordering on ridiculous, statement, given the number of millionaire and billionaire entrepreneurs that dropped out of school.

What’s worse is that he is blurring the contexts. His comments about the issues of dropout rates in the U.S. are real concerns. The underlying causes are cultural and political in nature. Often these rates contribute to or stem from our high rates of illiteracy, immaturity, teenage drug abuse and general lack of self-accountability necessary for developing a successful career.

That is not the problem AT&T is facing.

Stephenson wants to pay high-school graduate wages to college-educated engineers (not technicians, but engineers). Like he can do with workers in India.

Yes, our education system is a problem for many in our country. I’ve written about that problem before a couple of times recently. But don’t even try to equate that problem with the fact that someone wants highly-educated employees to work for wages far below what’s fair.

Sure, outsourcing to India has been a huge cost-saving measure for many companies. For the long-term, though, that’s not going to be good for business. Someone at AT&T apparently recognized that fact, since they promised to repatriate 5,000 jobs. Whining about the fact that comparably educated people here earn more isn’t going to help the cause.

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