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Where Small Town America is Thriving – Conclusion

It is widely assumed that high-tech employment, for the most part, will cluster either in big cities or their suburbs. But some venture funders, including some from Silicon Valley, are taking a look at smaller cities, notably in the Midwest. Several smaller cities have achieved growth in STEM jobs (science, technology, engineering and math-related) that are far above the national average over the past decade. Much of this has to do with the location of federal labs or universities. The leader, California-Lexington Park, located on Maryland’s scenic eastern shore, has a strong presence in the aerospace and defense industries, and has seen its STEM employment, already 3.5 times the national average, grow 22.3% since 2007. Other STEM-rich smaller towns include the afore-mentioned Los Alamos, No. 8 Kennewick-Richland, Wash., home to the Hanford federal laboratory, No. 4 Lawrence, Kansas, home of the University of Kansas and No. 9 Bremerton-Silverdale, Wash., home to the Puget Sound naval shipyard.Less predictable however has been the STEM growth in No. 3 Jackson, Mich., where a large public utility and post-recession growth of automotive and machinery manufacturing may explain a surprising 26.4% growth in STEM. Jackson is a hub for engineering talent, where the engineering job count is up 44% in the last decade and now 3.2 times more concentrated than national average.

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The Agurban
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