Sucking Sound of Jobs Leaving Bangalore?

You’ve probably never heard of Kannada, the native language of Karnataka. You’ve probably never heard of Karnataka either. But there’s a good chance you’ll chat with a Karnatakan if your iPod ever locks up or you have trouble installing the new Windows Vista operating system.

That’s because Karnataka is the Indian state whose capital city, Bangalore, is "the back office to the world." Bangalore is awash in call centers for Western companies such as Apple and Microsoft, boasts over 200 high tech companies of its own, and enjoys the highest number of engineering colleges of any city on Earth.

But if an Indian court doesn’t step in soon, the out-sourcing capital of the world may put itself out of work.

If the crackdown on these schools succeeds, the English-fluent high-tech labor pool will gradually drain away and the sucking sound of jobs leaving Bangalore will be audible all the way to North America.

From the Cato Institute article "Only in Kannada, Eh?"