Computer services and the development of rural areas: Trends in the Pacific Northwest in the 1990s

Some researchers hypothesize that the increasing use of computers and telecommunications will lead to a greater flexibility in the location of jobs, particularly in nonmetro counties. Others see the continued dominance of metro counties, especially in well-paid employment. This research examines change in employment in the service category of computer and data processing comparing this with the broader categories of business and producer services. Trends in metro and nonmetro counties of the Pacific Northwest in the 1990s are evaluated to see if inequality between county types in these industry categories widened or narrowed over time. Findings from this research indicate that while nonmetro counties did increase their share of overall employment, employment in producer, business and, notably, computer services remained highly concentrated in metro counties. Location quotients also show that computer service employment was increasingly over-represented in dominant metro economies. In addition, the inequality in estimated salaries between the two largest metro counties in the region and other county types increased substantially in the short time period under consideration.