Tech jobs rise, but ‘silicon’ vision a stretch: The world beyond just computing

The world is about more than computing.  It’s easy for those of us who live and work in CS to see it as CS-centric.  I work in a section of Atlanta that is bursting with high-tech startups.  I found this article compelling — not because it threw cold water on the vision of Atlanta as a “Silicon Valley East,” but because it painted a picture of how much more diverse the economy in Atlanta really is.

In reality, metro Atlanta’s relationship with the tech sector is, well, complicated.

Georgia boasts about 280,000 tech jobs, according to Technology Association of Georgia president and chief executive officer Tino Mantella — the great majority of them in metro Atlanta. But information technology jobs only make up about 3.5 percent of the area’s labor market, down from a peak of 4.7 percent in the 1990s, federal Bureau of Labor data shows.

And California, home to the real Silicon Valley, dominates venture capital investing — the lifeblood of tech startups — with 56 percent of spending compared to the 1 percent in Georgia, Mantella said.

via Tech jobs rise, but ‘silicon’ vision a stretch | www.ajc.com.