Eric Knorr
Contributing writer

Calling all world travelers

analysis
Jun 23, 20082 mins

I like living where I do. The climate agrees with me; the views are to die for; the people are relaxed. More to the point, living on the edge of Silicon Valley gives me a sense of career security: Were...

I like living where I do. The climate agrees with me; the views are to die for; the people are relaxed. More to the point, living on the edge of Silicon Valley gives me a sense of career security: Were this job to evaporate, I figure I’m most likely to find another one here rather than somewhere else.

But as Nick Naylor said in Thank You for Smoking, I have a mortgage to pay. If I didn’t — and I had real technical talent and experience as opposed to a job where I write about other people’s technical talent and experience — I’d consider exploiting my expertise to get a job in another exotic locale.

That’s the premise of Ephraim Schwartz’s magnum opus Offshore yourself!. Been downsized? Don’t like the opportunities here in the U.S.? Well pack up your talents and move to Dubai. Or Dublin. Or how about Kiev? Those are a few of the 12 cities and 6 regions covered in Ephraim’s guide to globetrotting for the IT professional.

This is an eminently practical guide, with information about lifestyle, work visas, and cost of living as well as the specifics about tech job possibilities. And although you’ll find some obvious tech hotspots, the beauty of Ephraim’s article is that you’ll probably encounter places of employment you never considered — Sao Paulo, say, or Tel Aviv.

For years Ephraim has been writing about offshoring, H1-B visa legislation, the relative impoverishment of U.S. computer science education, and other hot-button issues related to globalization and tech industry jobs. In a way, Offshore yourself! is the culmination of all that good work.

As much as some of us would like to, we can’t stop U.S. technology companies from sending work overseas or from lobbying Congress to allow more foreign workers. It’s been four years since Thomas Friedman wrote The World Is Flat and I have yet to hear a convincing refutation of the basic idea: Telecommunications and the political pragmatism of foreign governments have lowered barriers that once artificially sustained America’s technological edge. One effect of that transformation is that if you have the right programming or engineering or management chops, you suddenly have the opportunity to work in all sorts of interesting countries.

So go ahead. Join the global community; see the world.

Eric Knorr

Eric Knorr is a freelance writer, editor, and content strategist. Previously he was the Editor in Chief of Foundry’s enterprise websites: CIO, Computerworld, CSO, InfoWorld, and Network World. A technology journalist since the start of the PC era, he has developed content to serve the needs of IT professionals since the turn of the 21st century. He is the former Editor of PC World magazine, the creator of the best-selling The PC Bible, a founding editor of CNET, and the author of hundreds of articles to inform and support IT leaders and those who build, evaluate, and sustain technology for business. Eric has received Neal, ASBPE, and Computer Press Awards for journalistic excellence. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin, Madison with a BA in English.

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