and transforming resources of industrial society. The crucial "variable" for any society, therefore, is the strength of its basic research and science and technological resources-in its universities, in its research laboratories, and in its capacity for scientific and technological development." As Bell's chart (Table 3) shows, the postindustrial society's "transforming resource" is information, and its "strategicable resource" is knowledge. Ironically, a glance at the economic development initiatives debated in the Northwest in the 1980s reveals a region focused on moving from a pre-industrial to an industrial economyf based on Bell's terminology. William Paisley, a Stanford University communications theorist, has insisted that even Bell's vision of the "post-industrial society" is already out-of-date. He examines the skills people need in the Information Age and identifies the coming era with the "algorithm"-the computer programmer's term for a highly structured series of steps that must be followed to complete a task-a computer's "recipe." Paisley asks us to look beyond the "information age" to the Age of Algorithms, in which the primary resource "is the intelligence of people. Developing this resource is not only a cultural Table 2. Percentage of workers in each job role ALASKA IDAHO Total number of workers 206,000 412,000 INFORMATION-BASED OCCUPATIONS Executive, administrative 13.3% 8.9% Professional speciality 13.3% 11.5% Technicians 2.7% 2.6% Sales 9.7% 11.2% Clerical 17.9% 15.6% OTHER OCCUPATIONS Service 14.5% 14.3% Precision production 14.6% 11.9% Machine operators 2.6% 5.5% Transportation 4.5% 4.9% Handlers, laborers 3.9% 3.8% Farming, forestry, fishing 2.9% 9.8% priority; it is an economic priority as well." In the Age of Algorithms, economic value is derived from "information-seeking, problem-solving, decisionmaking, and other tasks of learning, working, and everyday life." How well has our region understood, anticipated, and responded to these trends? As elsewhere in the West, the pioneer traditions of individual enterprise and limited public planning have dominated the development of the information economy. Our region is dotted with creative and important projects, but no unifying vision or common purpose guides these isolated efforts. Paisley tells us that the priority is the "intelligence of people," and Bell stresses that "knowledge and information" are the transforming resources of this new age. Yet a look at the Northwest's principal efforts in social and economic development reveals modest activity in these areas. Instead, economic development remains focused on the attraction and subsidy of manufacturing industry, particularly those in the high-technology fields, and the region's innovative projects are isolated and underfunded: • In)983, the Washington Legislature created the Washington High Technology Coordinating Board "to improve the state's climate for technological development." The board has MONTANA OREGON WASHINGTON 359,000 1,192,000 1,832,000 9.6% 10.8% 11.7% 12.0% 12.4%. 14.3% 1.9% 2.9% 3.1% 12.3% 11.5% 11.9% 13.3% 17.0% 14.0% 14.5% 13.8% 13.6% 12.6% 9.3% 11.9% 3.2% 6.4% 4.8% 5.8% 4.2% 4.3% 3.9% 5.1% 4.6% 10.7% 6.6% 5.6% Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor s'tatistics. Geographic Profile of Employment and Occupation-1983. October 1984. Bulletin 2216, P. 61. Page 6 RAIN Fall/Winter 1986
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