From Ann Arbor to Auburn Hills, you have any kind of engineer you want. These people have been working on the productivity issues that industrialized countries around the world are concerned with. Yet even as the traditional extractive industries in these regions imploded, entrepreneurs have come in with new ideas and concepts that have more than replaced what was lost in the down years. Today, for example, Houston stands not only as an oil center, but one of the nation's leading trade and industrial centers, with a wide diversity of industries that span business services, traditional manufacturing, trade and, increasingly, more high-technology firms. The energy industry totally dominated Houston by the 1970s.
Every boom leads people to forget other parts of the economy.
After the bust, people saw the importance of the ports and trade. We became a more diversified kind of economy. One critical factor, Smith suggests, reflective of a key American advantage, has been Houston's highly diverse population base and their growing entrepreneurial clout. This polygot mixture plays an important role in developing clients and contacts for exporters. But perhaps the most spectacular example of an entrepreneur-led comeback can be seen in California.