The Other Side of Tech Support
There is this interesting article from PC World about “the other end of the tech support line”. It primarily talks about India compared to the US. However, I believe this is generally applicable to use too.
The article describes that in the US, you get an entry level tech support worker with about two (2) of week of training and pay them $7 per hour of work. In India, you get advanced degree in computer science working on the same job for $13,000 a year which translates to about $4.5 per hour. This also applies to Philippines.
The interesting thing is the Slashdot commentary. Most of the discussion focuses on avoiding L1 tech support jobs and telling people to focus on L2 and L3 jobs. However, the strange thing is that the level of training and education that their third world counterparts have. You really cannot compare two (2) weeks of training with an advanced computer science degree. Right? Of course for the third world tech support counterpart, $4 per hour is really not bad for an entry level job (L1 tech support).
