A leading labor economist says a college degree may protect many workers from having their jobs sent overseas, renewing debate over who is most exposed to offshoring and why. The comments come as companies reassess global staffing in customer service, back-office finance, and information technology, especially in hubs such as India and the Philippines.
Carl Benedikt Frey, an Oxford academic known for research on technology and jobs, argued that education can limit offshoring risk by moving workers into roles that are harder to relocate. His message lands amid shifting cost pressures, a tight labor market in some countries, and growing use of remote work tools that make cross-border hiring easier.
Why Education Matters in Offshoring
“College can help safeguard employees from having their jobs offshored to India or the Philippines,” Carl Benedikt Frey told Fortune.
Frey’s point centers on task content. Routine and rules-based work travels more easily across borders. Jobs demanding deep problem-solving, client trust, regulatory judgment, or close coordination with on-site teams tend to stay put. College often serves as a signal for these higher-skill roles, though actual skills and experience still matter.
Business process outsourcing to India and the Philippines has grown for decades. Both countries supply large English-speaking workforces with experience in call centers, payroll processing, and IT support. As collaboration software improved, companies expanded what they could shift abroad. Yet many firms keep roles that require local context, face-to-face contact, or security-sensitive access.
Shifts in Global Services Work
During the pandemic, remote work normalized distributed teams. That lowered barriers to hiring contractors or vendors in lower-cost markets. At the same time, new data rules, customer expectations, and cyber risks raised the bar for which tasks can be moved.
Analysts say employers now slice jobs into tasks. Some tasks migrate to external providers, while strategy, client-facing work, and integration remain close to headquarters. Degrees are common in these retained roles, especially in analytics, product management, compliance, and design.
Who Is Most Exposed
Exposure varies by sector and task mix. Entry-level support jobs are often first in line. Mid-career roles that combine technical skill with client interaction are safer. Senior roles involving oversight, regulation, or confidential data are less likely to move.
- High exposure: routine data entry, basic customer support, standardized testing and QA.
- Medium exposure: IT administration, bookkeeping, marketing operations.
- Lower exposure: product strategy, risk and compliance, user research, enterprise sales engineering.
Pay and career paths also differ. Positions that anchor on problem framing, storytelling with data, and team leadership hold a wage premium and face fewer offshoring bids. Degrees help workers reach those tracks faster, though alternative pathways—certificates, apprenticeships, and employer training—can also work.
AI, Automation, and the Education Question
Frey’s past work on automation risk informs this picture. As software takes over repeatable tasks, the remaining work relies more on human judgment. That shift aligns with roles often filled by college graduates. AI can also complement overseas teams, complicating the calculus. Companies may automate some tasks and offshore others, while elevating domestic jobs into coordination and design.
Some labor advocates caution against turning degrees into gatekeepers. They argue that employers should hire for skills and provide training, noting that many strong contributors lack formal credentials. Still, hiring data shows degrees remain a common filter for roles that are less portable.
What Employers and Workers Can Do
Companies balancing cost and resilience are rethinking job design. They keep sensitive and client-heavy work domestic, build partnerships for specialized offshore tasks, and invest in cross-border governance. Workers sizing up career risk can shift their skill mix toward tasks that are harder to relocate.
- Build capabilities in communication, problem structuring, and stakeholder management.
- Develop data literacy and product sense alongside technical skills.
- Pursue credentials that signal judgment and accountability, whether a degree or targeted certificates.
- Gain experience in regulated or client-facing environments.
Frey’s argument is pragmatic: education steers people toward roles that resist relocation. Offshoring will continue where it makes business sense, especially for standardized work. But jobs built on trust, context, and complex coordination are stickier. For workers, the takeaway is clear. Move up the value chain. For employers, the challenge is to design roles—and training—that keep critical skills close to home while tapping global talent where it fits.
As AI advances and remote collaboration deepens, the boundary of what can move will shift again. Watch for companies to refine which tasks stay domestic, which go abroad, and which disappear into software. Education, formal or not, will help decide who benefits from that shift.
