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Call Center Operators Promise 100,000 New Jobs, But Access Is A Concern for Potential Applicants

A coalition of call center operators is hoping to bring back some of the jobs that have been outsourced over the last decade.The Jobs4America group has promised to create 100,000 customer service jobs in the United States. About 200 of the new jobs will be in Jeffersonville, where Jobs4America member Accent Marketing Services is building a new call center. Hundreds more jobs could require no office at all."Every single thing that a customer service agent can do in this facility they can do at home as long as they have a broadband-connected screen and a company that's willing to provide those opportunities for people at home," said Federal Communications Commission Chair Julius Genachowski at a ceremony at the call center today.But telecommuting jobs will be off limits to the one hundred million Americans–one third of the country–who do not have broadband internet access. Of those, twenty million of those people do not live in areas where broadband is available. Further, the demand for wireless broadband access is pushing providers to the limit. Genachowski says those are all issues the FCC is hoping to resolve, partially through federal support for improved and expanded infrastructure.The jobs are expected to stimulate small cities' economies, but will not likely make a dent in the nationwide 9.2 percent unemployment rate. Hundreds of thousands of jobs were lost every month during the peak of the recession.