Anti-outsourcing move will hurt US: Pranab

Chicago : The anti-outsourcing measures US President Barack Obama announced last week are unacceptable and will hurt both American and Indian economies, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has said.

Talking to mediapersons at the end of a two-day visit here, Mukherjee said outsourcing of jobs had helped increase the profitability of American companies and any move to discourage such activities would hurt them.

Mukherjee’s comments Sunday came after Obama last week raised concerns on outsourcing, calling out US firms to bring jobs back home.

In his State Of the Union address, Obama had said the companies which provided jobs at home would get a bigger tax break while those outsourced jobs would have to pay more tax.

Urging all countries to avoid creating barriers for movement of trade and services, Mukherjee warned that growing protectionist tendencies in the US and some other countries would hurt the global economy.

“I do believe that there is merit in giving up protectionism and I do hope that the countries will not resort to protectionism.”

Mukherjee said the world trade and economic growth had increased substantially in the last two decades mainly because of dismantling of barriers.

“Growth in world output over the years have been substantial because of a substantially removal of tariff and non-tariff barriers,” he said.