The Business Cost of Cheaper Labor: Offshoring, AI, and a Shrinking Workforce

We Have Better, Cheaper Talent Overseas and Other Ways We’re Hollowing Out the Workforce

If you spend any time on business platforms, leadership forums, or social media, you’ve seen this statement repeated with increasing confidence: We have better, cheaper talent overseas.

Offshore. Nearshore. Overseas. Different words. Same message.

If you want the same results for less money, just send the job somewhere else.

This isn’t a new concept, and it’s important to say this clearly upfront: geography should not limit access to great talent. The best person for a role does not automatically live within commuting distance of your office, and global talent—when used intentionally—can absolutely be part of a healthy business strategy. But that’s not what we’re watching unfold. What we’re seeing now is cost-driven replacement masquerading as innovation.

The Double Standard We’ve Normalized

On one side, we tell U.S.-based candidates—especially for entry and mid-level white-collar roles—that they need a college degree, years of experience, and often six figures of student debt to qualify for a $60–65k job we openly admit we think we’re overpaying for.

On the other side, we shrug and say, “Give me someone overseas for $10–$12 an hour. That’s a livable wage where they are.”

Same role. Same expectations. Completely different standards. That’s not a global talent strategy. That’s wage arbitrage.

This Isn’t Slowing Down — It’s Accelerating

There aren’t clean headline statistics for this, but payroll data, financial reporting, and job movement trends tell a consistent story. Roughly 30,000 to 40,000 U.S.-based roles are sent overseas each year, and that number is increasing—not declining.

Do the math.

Since 2015, that’s more than 3 million U.S.-based jobs gone, largely entry- and mid-level roles—the very positions people rely on to start careers, develop skills, and move into leadership.

Roles in Call centers, Talent acquisition, IT and tech support, HR, Finance and back-office functions. Rebranded as offshore or the newer, friendlier term nearshore. Same result.

The Real Value Proposition No One Wants to Say Out Loud

I recently engaged with someone whose entire business model is built around offshore assistants. The pitch was familiar: better support, better results, better talent—at a fraction of the cost. So I asked a simple, honest question: What’s the real value? The answer, stripped of marketing language, was straightforward and one simple word: cost

That was followed by the familiar justification—geography shouldn’t matter, talent exists everywhere.

I agree. So let’s say the quiet part out loud together…

You’re telling me there is no talent in the United States capable of helping businesses grow if paid a living wage. That the only path to profitability is paying someone much less overseas, avoiding benefits, insurance, payroll burden, and long-term responsibility??

But if the role stays here?

Now we require degrees, experience, flexibility, loyalty—and the ability to survive on far less than the job actually demands.

That’s not efficiency. That’s avoidance.

Counterpoint: This Is Not an Anti-Global Talent Argument

This matters, so let’s be clear.

Global talent is not the enemy. Offshore and nearshore teams can absolutely add value when used thoughtfully, ethically, and strategically. Many overseas professionals are highly skilled, capable, and deserve respect—not exploitation.

The issue isn’t where people live. The issue is when cost becomes the ONLY metric. Especially when it becomes the Key metric to profitability. Not sales growth, Not value growth….Cost.

When business decisions stop factoring in sustainability, knowledge retention, long-term growth, and economic impact, what’s left isn’t strategy - it’s short-term math.

When Did Business Become Only Slash, Dash, and Repeat?

At some point, we stopped talking about building durable companies and started optimizing for the fastest savings possible. Cheap. Fast. Replaceable.

Now add AI to the mix. So what’s the plan? Automate 50% of the workforce? Offshore another 20–25%?

And when there are 50 people competing for every remaining job—then what? Set up gladiator ring?

Because here’s the question no one seems eager to answer: when people don’t have work, who buys your products and services?

This isn’t hypothetical.

Today, roughly 54.9% of Americans are functionally underemployed, and the true unemployment rate sits closer to 25.9% when measured against the working-age population. We are already living inside the early warning signs and yes, the call is coming…from inside the house.

Here’s the Part We’re Ignoring: We Have Solutions at Home

What makes this even harder to swallow is that the experience businesses claim they can’t afford still exists…RIGHT HERE!

Consultants, Trainers., Fractional leaders, Advisors, HR Services, Tech Services, Representatives…..They’re everywhere today.

Not because it’s trendy—but because so many experienced professionals are functionally underemployed and putting decades of knowledge to work in new ways. Operations, recruiting, training, leadership development, systems design—the expertise businesses say they “can’t find” is readily available.

Here. Today. Affordable. Flexible. Proven.

Which raises an uncomfortable question:

If experience, skill, and support are available domestically in scalable, cost-effective ways… why is the default response still to send the work somewhere else? Or maybe the next logical step is this:

We all retire overseas, then sell our services back as offshore solutions. Apparently, that’s when the value shows up??

The Real Irony

There are businesses founded here, headquartered here, and profiting here whose entire model is built on not employing people here. Selling “better, cheaper labor” while operating comfortably inside the very economy they’re helping hollow out.

That’s not innovation. That’s irony with a spreadsheet.

Global talent isn’t the problem. Cost-only thinking is.

If we want businesses that grow, scale, and actually last, the answer isn’t racing to the bottom—it’s investing in systems, skills, and people in ways that make long-term sense, because eventually, cheap runs out.

And when it does, what you built—or failed to build—will matter.