June 29, 2007
A study by two law students of Indian origin in a recent issue of Harvard Law Bulletin (HLB) has placed the legal profession as the latest entrant to join the bandwagon of service professions being outsourced to India from the US. It lists out the range of services from document processing and litigation support to patent applications, contract drafting and even brief writing, including a brief for a tax case that went before the US Supreme Court.
In short, from law case analysis to professional paralegal services to online legal research, legal process outsourcing includes processing legal documents for compliance with various regulators including sale deeds, affidavits, wills and subrogation, legal counselling, legal implications of tax planning and other legal consulting services. The apparent attractiveness of outsourcing legal services India stems from the Indian talent pool and cost effectiveness.
According to the report, 12,000 legal jobs comprising half legal, half para-legal or research were outsourced in 2004 and much more since then has been going to India even though it comes nowhere close to the estimated $192.7 billion spent on legal services in the US over the same period. Legal research outsource , accounting jobs, , and architectural drafting work are being taken to India like never before.
The high-end outsourcing buzz has taken Citigroup, Boeing, and Eli Lilly by storm who are moving out white-collar elitist jobs including investment banking, aircraft design, and the clinical testing of drugs in a big way.
The uprooting of jobs and professional work of well-educated Americans who have been enjoying cushy jobs till now is evoking further predictions which are coming as a rude shock. Economist Alan Binder, a former top official at the Federal Reserve, says "We have, so far, barely seen the tip of the offshoring iceberg, the eventual dimensions of which may be staggering."
In fact the figure stands much beyond the 42 million American workers that he points to. As to what is in store for the middle class, Binder says America needs to increase jobs that cannot be outsourced, like where people are required in person. In the wake of the stir caused by legal services outsourcing, there is an immediate need to make policies to revitalize American's middle-class.