John Naisbitt MEGATRENDS Intelligently Altered DRAWING BY TIM BRAUN i t could be argued that the success of the bellwether environmental policies of Oregon was motivated by economic development. Visit-but-don’t-stay Gov. Tom McCall wasn’t so much anti-industry or anti-growth as he was aware of the fact that Oregon’s biggest industries — timber, agriculture, tourism — depended on a healthy natural environment. They weren’t industries that had to be catered “The decentralization of America has transformed politics, business, our very culture... State and local govern ments are the most important political entities in America.” recently been floundering, its many clones (Floating Point, Metheus, etc.) and a host of recent arrivals (including Intel, Wacker) have made Oregon the 9th largest concentration of electronics companies. Yet the promise of the electronics field is not without problems, and it’s certainly no panacea. Steven Deutsch, a University of Oregon professor whose special areas of interest include state economic development and labor-related issues, sounds warnings against throwing all our eggs into the high- tech basket. A recent study of U.S. labor statistics by Stanford University showed that only 6 percent of the national workforce is in the high tech field; only 8 percent of the new jobs provided over the next 20 years will come from there. Of these, only a few will be in the glamorous, high paying upper echelons of management. Most will be in low paying, unskilled, poorly union represented and possibly dangerous positions. Yet recruiting these companies is the linchpin of the Atiyeh plan for economic recovery. Ed Whitelaw, a University of Oregon economics professor, is president of ECO Northwest, Ltd., a private consulting firm. He was also on Gov. Atiyeh’s economic advisory council for two years. He claims that Oregon policy-makers, both Democrats and Republicans, have been oblivious to or ideologically suspicious of alternatives to recruitment for some time. Whitelaw mentions a few exceptions, ranging the state political spectrum from Republican Larry Campbell to Democrat Barbara Roberts. Bill Street, labor market economist for Eastern Oregon for the to with tax breaks, lax regulatory processes or other questionable incentives. Along with an environmentally clean, economically healthy homegrown electronics industry, those businesses allowed us to be socially progressive in environmental and lifestyle issues. That complacency was challenged by the 1980-82 recession, when Georgia- Pacific moved out to Atlanta, and when Hyster, Evans Products and scores of timber-related firms shut down or severely cut back operations. Though business has picked up, overall the state is still reeling and readjusting. Construction activity is still down, with interest rates keeping residential construction on the rocks, and West Coast timber is losing its eastern market, which has more than two- thirds of the nation’s population, to the non-union, less-distant South. Many of our agricultural commodities face similar obstacles in the marketplace. And tourism has never returned to pre-embargo levels, though it has been on the rise. Only the electronics industry has maintained and improved on its recent record, so much so that it is now being touted as our saving grace. Though Tektronix has I A/ hile Oregon’s economic recovery has lagged far behind the F F nation’s, we’ve been treated to the spectacle of a peripatetic governor in search ofthe holy grail—newindustry, preferably non-polluting. From the golf courses of Hawaii to the shores of Tripoli, we are told he’s cutting deals and greasing wheels, in our best interest, of course. And though he’s had his successes, the state continues to languish. Where he’s failed to look is where our best hope may lie — the innovative, self-sustaining economic plans being implemented and developed in a number of states. If we are to return to the forefront of the social and economic currents now flowing elsewhere, we must draw strongly on both our deep-rooted traditions and the best we can learn from those exercising1 leadership elsewhere. We're two full years from relief from the Atiyeh program, a time we must make the most of. OUT OF THE WOODS “Oregon shouldn't be a hussy throwing herself at every smokestack that comes along.” Tom McCall 10 Clinton St. Quarterly
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