[refurb]

I don't think it's really all that avoidable. If you can outsource high tech work for less, why wouldn't you?

That being said, I've heard that wages for PhDs in China and India have gone up from 30% of that in the US to 70-80%. Combine that with the hassle of outsourcing (knowledge transfer, etc) it's become less advantageous than it was 10 years ago.