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New York Guild president Barry Lipton says, "Instead of focusing
on producing the highest quality news, Reuters is now focussed on
producing the cheapest news. This change is not just bad for our
members, it's bad for Reuters and its clients."
The Guild states that it had alerted Reuters managers last August
that the exportation of jobs violated their contract. However, the
London-based news and information company went ahead with its plans
to expand its Bangalore-based editorial staff that was set up to
write about American companies and other selected US financial news.
Lipton adds, "This is remote-control journalism, with low-paid
reporters in India writing US news to US editors. It produces a
cheaper product but adds no value to stories with reporting at the
source." Although no Guild-covered employees have lost jobs
to offshore outsourcing to date, that could change in a few weeks
with the Reuters' plans to move other US-based editorial jobs to
Canada and Singapore.
The exportation of New York-based reporting jobs to Bangalore comes
just a few years after Reuters built its Times Square office tower
and received millions of dollars in tax breaks by agreeing to retain
and increase jobs in the city. The Guild and Reuters have been in
contract negotiations for more than two years, with management seeking
to slash healthcare coverage, retirement benefits and job security.
Reuters reporters in Bangalore are mostly responsible for extracting
basic financial information from company news releases and quarterly
earnings reports. Tasks like interviewing a company president, talking
to analysts and covering breaking news, will continue to be done
by more experienced journalists working in the countries where those
companies operate.
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