Barcelona for Offshoring

In the latest BusinessWeek, a pretty detailed article on  the growth of offshoring services in Barcelona.

A number of people I've met in the last few months have been doing call center work. It seems to suit the lifestyle desired here, as you can get 20-hour work weeks, leaving lots of time for the partying/beachgoing/etc. that attracts people here in the first place.

The figures cited are the first I've seen that concretely size the market and key players here, and they are pretty impressive.

The article mentions rising wages as a threat to the boom. But the wages aren't really rising that fast, at least from what I hear, because there is an endless supply of people coming to Spain to try to make a living. The real threat is in the skyrocketing cost of living, particularly in housing, that basically makes call center work a guarantee of poverty living. This is fine for 20-somethings coming to party for a couple years, but it's definitely not sustainable for career-building.

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