Why Is the Focus on Innovation and New Technologies As the Solution to the Jobs Crisis?

While creating new industries and innovative technologies may be a long-term solution to systemic unemployment, they will take years to move from concept to development and finally deployment. The existing U.S. workforce is not prepared to undertake radical changes in the life skills needed to succeed in these new high-tech industries. The job mix in our current economy is weighted to the service sector by more than 80%. Within the call center sector alone, we have lost more than 7 million jobs to India and the Philippines and other low-cost markets. While these jobs are not the highest paying and are certainly not glamorous, they are jobs that are easily learned and can absorb large numbers of workers right now. Why can?t we act to protect these jobs and reverse the migration of call center work back to the United States?