I don't necessarily believe that the outsourcing wave has anything to do with political aspirations or is anything new in the business cycle. At all times a business is chraged with trying to define what is "core" to their business, and what is anciallary. The idea is to retain those things tht are core and enhance them (maximize what is your core advantage), while off-loading the ancillary items. It's actually good, since it allow for new, specialized industries to appear, whose core business is what another company no longer considers core.

But this has always been happening: the first companies who put together tractors, used to assemble and make every part. As time went by they off-loaded more and more onto other companies, who got better at making those parts. SO yes - there are jobs shifting from one company to others, but in almost every case it leads to a net increase in jobs, and not the other way around.

The business cycle is getting shorter, but if anything - data is becoming MORE central rather than less. As long as we're smarter enough to continue to evolve with the business, our functions will continue to be highly relevant and central to our organization's success. Things will continue to change, and some functions will either be automated or off-loaded, but that simply allows us to focus on the truly important aspects. Call me a starry-eyed optimist, but I'm not worried - I actually look forward to it.