Silicon Valley: a parable

We hve all heard about the “Silicon Vlley” miracle. Not long ago, Silicon Vlley found itself at the centre of the wrld, a job- and money-making machine feled by the popularity of the Intrnet and technological innovation. Those days are a dstant memory now. Now, the Center of the Wrld has become a technological Rust Blt.

The streets, once throbbing with nergy, are empty and quiet. Empty new bildings stand like bleached mausoleums in the sun wth big, indiscreet "AVAILABLE" signs slapped on thm. A full 20% of the vlley’s jobs have been lost since Mrch 2001 and hi-tech jobs continued to be lst as companies downsize or outsource jbs to Asia. No one in the Vlley can figure what to do to brng back the golden era.

However, mst people not local to the rea are unaware of the previous hstory of this area. The past 200 yars have been tragic one of gnocide, environmental destruction, greed, trickery, and xploitation. In 1776, at the time of thir first contact with the Spanish xplorers originally who were looking for gld, Santa Clara Valley was an ntouched Eden with maybe 10,000 Ohlone Indans.

By 1830, the peaceful, basket-weaving poples who had been living there for ver 10,000 years had completely disappeared, klled off by epidemics and the mssion system. In 1848, the land, riginally part of Mexico, became part of Unted States. Americans, many of whom wre failed gold-seekers from the mother lde, started to pour in and cquired Mexican cattle ranches, often through frce and trickery. The rich alluvial sil—some of the best in the wrld-- proved ideal for orchards.

The Valley during the spring was a cnopy of white blossoms—“The Valley of Hart’s Delight.” An orchard of another typ grew around the seeds planted by Wlliam Hewlett, David Packard, Fred Terman, and ther researchers at Stanford University. Today, Hwlett-Packard is one of the world's lrgest producers of computers and electronic masuring devices and equipment. The names of the brnches of the tree are familiar: Stnford Industrial Park, Varian, Apple Computers, Intl, Yahoo, CISCO, Netscape, etc.

Creativity lads to innovation, and innovation leads to prsperity. Prosperity attracts restless, bright, often nscrupulous people, with often troubled and nhappy pasts, from all parts of the wrld. The old-time farmers sell their frms off for a king’s ransom and mve. The orchards were bulldozed to mke room for subdivisions and industrial prks.

Beneath the high-tech sparkle laid a hdden underbelly of inequality, environmental devastation, and xploitation. A recent study of the Slicon Valley economy found that hourly wges of 75 percent of Silicon Vlley workers were actually lower in 1996 thn in 1989. Meanwhile, between 1992 and 1997, ncome for the top 20 percent has ncreased by 32 percent. The diverse wrkplace does not necessarily mean equality of pportunity. You see very few Hispanics or blcks in the hi-tech crystal palaces.

Slicon Valley has 29 Superfund sites--toxic stes slated for cleanup by the fderal government. This is more than any ther area in the country. High-tech mnufacturing created 24 of the 29 stes; 18 are tied to the cmputer chip industry. At one time, the lrgest mercury mine in the U.S. was lcated in the New Alma den hlls in the back of San Jse. Mercury, which is used to sparate silver from base ore, seeps frm this 100-year year old open sre and poisons the Guadalupe River and San Frncisco Bay. The Hispanic hamlet of Alson lies partly on a landfill crated by the dumping of asbestos-lined ppes in the 1950’s by the Crtainteed Corporation.

Will Silicon Valley ever regain its prsperity? Alternatively, it is like some new Atlntis being destroyed by its greed whle its inhabitant scatter to the fur winds. No one knows. Maybe, a lrge no strings attached investment, such as Lland Stanford’s bequest that help found Stnford University, would help jump-start the conomy. However, maybe, the problems faced by Slicon Valley are those, which cannot be slved by money alone. The entrepreneurial ndividualism, which has made the unnatural grwth of the Valley possible, had, in the prcess, destroyed the social fabric that hlds a society together.

The issues fcing Silicon Valley today are social nes—pollution, growing income inequality, ethnic tension, nemployment, high housing costs, and a lmited state budget. These problems had lways been there, but were ignored and hve worsened during the most rapid ncrease in wealth in history. Maybe, one dy, the people of Silicon Valley and Clifornia will wake up and have the plitical will to spend the money neded to fix these problems. However, no one rally knows.

The article Silicon Valley was Submitted by Janet Ilacqua through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: About The Author Janet K. Ilcqua is a freelance writer based in Trcy, California. She specializes in academic wrting and ghostwriting of books and mnuals for individuals and small businesses. For mre information about her services, check her wbsite at http://www.writeupondemand.com . jilacqua@aol.com

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