WASHINGTON, May 17 (Xinhuanet) -- The movement of US service jobs offshore to low-cost countries is growing faster than expected, the US Forrester Research said on Monday.

    The research firm said that 830,000 of such jobs are expected to move outside of the United States by the end of 2005, 40 percent higher than an earlier projection of 588,000 jobs.

    The report showed that by the end of 2003, 315,000 US service jobs had been shifted offshore, representing less than one percent of the jobs in the affected categories. However, this percentage is expected to grow to 1.6 percent by the end of 2005.

    The Forrester Research also forecast a slight increase in the projected number of US service jobs moving offshore by 2015, to 3.4 million from 3.3 million.

    "Interest and use of offshoring continues to rise, particularly on the IT (information technology) side," said Forrester analyst John McCarthy.

    "At a time when businesses are trying to stretch their flatter IT budgets," he said, "companies are looking at offshore as doing more with less or the same amount." Enditem