Some Reactions to BLS Offshoring Report

"Pretty lame!" That's how Thea M. Lee, chief international economist at the AFL-CIO, described a new survey that suggests offshoring of American jobs is less of an economic threat than is popularly believed.

Conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the survey found that of the 239,361 people who lost their jobs during the first quarter of the year, only about 2 percent, or 4,633, were sacked for reasons "associated with the movement of work outside the country." That's a reassuring metric. Certainly, if it were accurate, it would go a long way toward quelling the concern that erupted last year over widely publicized cases of Americans losing their jobs to cheaper workers abroad. But, sadly, it may not show the complete picture.

The BLS survey covers only layoffs at companies with at least 50 workers, where at least 50 filed for unemployment insurance and the layoffs lasted more than 30 days. And it does not count jobs created by American companies overseas with no direct layoffs in the United States. Finally, the Labor Department compiled its data simply by asking companies who had reported layoffs whether they had offshored the positions eliminated. In the current political environment, company executives are likely a little reluctant to admit to such actions. "This is a company checking a box on a survey, and having little incentive to be completely forthcoming" about why it laid off a large number of employees, Lee told the Washington Post. "There's no kind of follow-up or investigation on the part of the BLS. So I don't think this is a particularly good way of doing an exhaustive measure of job loss. It's good they've gone in that direction, but it's not useful for the purpose of knowing what percentage of jobs lost have actually been outsourced."

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