|
New
Economy ties the West more tightly
to national trends, for better or for worse
By
Patricia Nelson Limerick
for Headwaters News
When
the fur trade slumped, the West's beavers must have breathed a sigh
of relief. In the 1820s, the fur-trappers were everywhere, and life
for the fur-bearers was a scramble.
In the years after the fashions shifted and beaver pelts lost their
status as the key material for European men's headgear, the beavers
have been celebrating the end of this particular boom with their
own species-based, revitalization movement.
Busts are not, in other words, inevitably bad news. A downturn in
a market for a particular natural resource can act as a kind of
unintended mandate for conservation.
And, in a situation where no other strategy seems to slow the pace
of growth, a dramatic economic downturn can put on the brakes with
a firmness that few land-use ordinances can match.
To Westerners committed to the preservation of ecosystems, habitats,
open space, recreation and cohesive communities, a bust may well
present itself as the only truly effective form of growth control.
And yet there are good reasons to see busts as the remedies of last
resort.
The fact that many Indian reservations have been in a continuous
state of "bust" for more than a century is the sternest
reminder of the difficulties a depressed economy can present. Many
non-Indian communities in the West also present resonant case studies
in the human costs of the sudden broken hopes, layoffs, prolonged
unemployment, forced relocations and broken community ties that
a bust can deliver.
Have an opinion? Join
the discussion in this week's forum.
Or click
here to view all our forums.
click
here for a printer-friendly version of this column
 |
 |
High
tech boosts parts of region's economy, but drags down others
By
Greg Lakes, editor
Headwaters News
July 10, 2002
High-tech enterprises are forever changing lifestyles
and livelihoods across the region, and they're adding a new set
of economic stresses.
Technology and the industries it has spawned drove Colorado's Front
Range boom, and Boise's and Salt Lake City's emergence as high-tech
hubs. It may bring jobs and unprecedented prosperity to a New Mexico
reservation.
And it has held out false hopes for thousands, particularly working
mothers, who find their high-tech job doesn't pay a living wage,
and it continues to draw sharp contrasts between depressed rural
areas and economically bustling cities.
In Gallup, N.M., where Indian unemployment consistently runs 50
percent or more, a coalition of government and private parties hope
to tap
traditional Zuni skills to build futuristic machines.
The idea is to build microsystems, tiny and intelligent machines
the size of blood cells, into larger systems, a concept put into
practice at Sandia National Labs.
The coalition wants to build a factory where the microsystems would
be assembled into electrical wire, and the result would be wiring
for aircraft that automatically senses impending problems and alerts
the pilots.
The process of building the wire is remarkably similar to Zuni traditional
beadcraft, jewelry making and braiding. Backers expect a military
contract worth several million dollars by the end of the summer,
with a private market of several billion dollars to follow.
New Mexico is on the brink of becoming a leader
in biomedical and biotech industries, spurred largely by research
at the state's federal labs and at the University of New Mexico.
Observers say about 2,600 researchers work in biomed, focused in
Albuquerque, and biotech, centered in Santa Fe and Los Alamos, and
about 40 percent of those companies are predicting growth this year
and next -- sharp contrast to the telecom and Internet industries.
Boise, a city perennially listed in somebody's Top 10 list of something
to do with high-tech, can trace its potent industry back to the
genesis of Hewlett Packard and Micron.
Observers estimate 400 high-tech companies in the Treasure Valley,
and about one-third of them are direct spinoffs of those two firms.
How big an impact has that had? State data say high-tech companies
in metro Boise employ 18,600 people, or at least 60 of every 1,000
private sector workers. Analysts figure about two jobs are created
in the economy for every high-tech position.
They say Hewlett Packard and Micron pull in top talent, and some
of those workers eventually start their own businesses or are hired
away to run another local firm.
The new companies hire from other local companies and develop a
more mature work force. That creates a deeper pool of experience
that the larger firms can select from, instead of having to recruit
from out-of-state, a cycle that has spared Boise the deep pain of
Denver.
Denver's
high-tech industry fell along with the twin towers, and it will
be months yet before the state's employment again reaches pre-Sept.
11 levels.
The latest debacle was WorldCom's, which added 500 layoffs to the
state's total of more than 11,000 for the first six months of 2002.
Qwest laid off several thousand and several financial companies
have laid off an aggregate 1,000.
About two-thirds of that total was technology and telecommunications
workers, about the same proportion as in 2001, when the state lost
31,500 jobs.
Part of the high-tech crisis was blamed on a glut of fiber-optic
cable, expensive infrastructure that many companies invested in
and never used, and a lesson about to be adamantly ignored in Provo,
Utah.
The city plans to extend
fiber to every home and business, a bold move officials say
will show those failed companies where they went wrong.
The problem was that those companies stopped short of "the
last mile" to end users that would have made the investment
pay.
Provo has built a fiber-optic ring around the city. Completing the
network within the city will cost $30 million to $40 million, which
officials plan to recoup by leasing access to private companies
that will provide residents and businesses.
In the rapidly growing corridor
between Coeur d'Alene and Spokane, call centers are one of the
fastest-growing industries.
Two companies alone have hired more than 1,400 people
in the last year, reportedly drawn to the area for its unemployed
and underemployed residents.
In Spokane County, more than 4,500 people work in the call center
industry. In Kootenai County, the number is about 2,100.
Most of the workers are women, and many came from lower-paying jobs
in retail, tourism or clerical work.
Call center wages range from $6.50 to $20 per hour and usually provide
benefits.
And while the number of call-center and electronic-assembly jobs
in Idaho is expected to double by 2008, more are expected to pay
less than what critics say is a livable wage.
The lure of high-tech jobs exacerbates Idaho's
rural emigration. Census estimates indicate the state's population
grew at twice the national rate in 2000, but 18 counties lost people,
many of whom moved to Boise and Coeur d'Alene to escape a deteriorating
rural economy.
Not that old economy industries are immune from traditional boom
and bust cycles. Wyoming's mining and oil and gas industries helped
boost
statewide employment by 3.5 percent late last year, and spurred
another bout of scarce housing in quintessential boomtown Gillette.
Gillette boomed in the late 1970s, busted
in the late 1980s and boomed again with the rush for coalbed
methane and President Bush's push for homegrown gas.
But this week, some producers announced they were capping wells
and curtailing operations as gas prices dropped below the cost of
production.
|
|
|
|
