OUTSOURCING/OFFSHORING

OUTSOURCING/OFFSHORING

This first cartoon, illustrated by Matson in the St Louis Post Despatch, portrays a satirical situation between three charcters. Primarily, the main protagonist is Mitt Romney, an American presedential candidate for the Republican party in the 2012 elections. He is seen standing on the Cayman Islands with a shovel, next to a hole and a chest full of money with his name writen on it. Romney in the cartoon holds the principal speech bubbles aswell which say " You outsource jobs so you don't have to pay more wages and benefits to your workers. You offshore your profits so you don't have to pay more taxes to your country." Surrounding the main character is two other countries Bermuda and Switzerland. But also, two other characters : two american citizens praising him saying "Gosh Grandpa Mitt, you are so smart ! You should be president !". These two republican fans are sitting on a massive yacht named Believen' in America. Indeed, I interpret this document as being a sort of moquerie towards the Republican party of the 2012 elections. The Republican vision Mitt Romney had seems to be extremely reliant on evading all troubles regarding wages and tax just to make loads of money. The excess of money can be seen in the document through the presence of a bling yacht and the huge chest of money. 

Matson's cartoon touches, of course, the topical issues of oursourcing and offshoring. Both these buisness and economical practices involve an exchange between two spaces. In a real way, companies will physically relocate a part of their production to another country in order to pay less wages and benefits to workers. However, the company will still remain American therefore all the earnt profit will, in a virtual way be sent back to the United States. It has to be said, that the cartoon also touches the hot topic of tax evasion by illustrating countries such as Bermuda, Cayman Islands and Switzerland : tax havens. Tax evasion, is a process that also is a virtual exchange of capital between two a spaces. Finally, this cartoon drawn by Matson in 2012 reflects the elections of the same year through Matt Romney's view of exploiting spaces through exhanges to earn more money. 

Secondly, this bottom cartoon called Simple Explained : Offshoring published in 2008 by Geek and Poke, is also a satirical and ironic illustratrion of offshoring. It is divided in 3 parts and presents a conversation between two sketch characters. The theme of the dialogue is exploitation and the overworking of man labour in developing or under-developed countries. Indeed, firms "move to the next country" in order to pay less wages. The irony is that in those countries, the salaries are equivalent to not getting paid in normal countries. Therefore, the boss is shocked when the workers ask for a pay rise. His reaction is "unbelievable". I interpret, this cartoon being a moquerie of multinational companies who gain masses of money by employing people in unhuman conditions whose wages are close to nothing. In relation to Spaces and Exhanges, this second cartoon raises awarenesss on the bad consequences of globalisation. This phenomenon, on the one side makes people richer (in the Northen Hemisphere), but on the other uses vulnerable people to work for nothing (in the Southern Hemisphere).