Brown Promotes Legislation to Protect Call Center Jobs
NILES, Ohio – The call center industry in Ohio employs nearly 200,000 workers, and U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown says he wants to prevent those jobs from going overseas.
Brown, D-Ohio, was joined by call center workers from AT&T at a press event Tuesday in support of legislation introduced by his fellow Democratic senator, Pennsylvania’s Bob Casey, to protect the center industry in this country.
Several companies operate call centers in the Mahoning Valley, including West Corp., InfoCision Management Corp. and VXI Global Solutions.
The United States Call Center Worker and Consumer Protection Act of 2012, of which Brown is a cosponsor, would require companies to disclose to callers when their calls are being transferred abroad; render businesses that move call centers abroad ineligible for federal grants or loans; direct the U.S. Department of Labor to publicly list companies that offshore call center jobs for three years after each relocation; and require agencies to give preference to U.S. companies that don’t appear on the list.
“We know what’s happened with the auto rescue, we know what’s happened with V&M Star, we know what happens when we enforce trade rules,” Brown said. “What that means is that we produce more American jobs and more people in this country are working.”
Brown noted that he recently spoke with an electrician, a cement mason and a laborer who all work at V&M. “The reason they’re working there is because the president and the Department of Commerce and the international Trade Commission and all of us stood up to the Chinese” over dumping of steel in this country at below cost, he said. When trade laws are enforced, “You see other things happen,” he said.
Don Harshbarger Jr., who works at AT&T’s Boardman call center, said the legislation would not only help support his family and community but also would protect callers’ personal information. Other countries where call centers are located don’t always have laws in place to protect such information, he said.
Employment over the past few years at the Boardman call center has doubled to more than 500, he noted.
“We look at this as very common-sense legislation,” said Ron Gay Jr., union representative with Communications Workers of America Local 4300. CWA reports that Ohio saw a net loss of 2,330 call center jobs between 2008 and 2011.
Copyright 2012 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.