ABSTRACT
This chapter begins the contextual assessment by looking at recent national and regional changes in employment generally. It explores the locational analysis by drawing up a national geography of high tech jobs. The chapter also analyses of the reasons behind the growth of high technology industries in what by that stage has been identified as the Western Crescent. It describes initially at the spatial divisions of high technology labour, and goes on to assess the early development of the area. The chapter discusses the results of a survey of high technology firms in Berkshire, carried out as part of the original project. Hall et al (1987) have compared growth in the seven UK sectors with an equivalent set of high tech industries in United States. The major centres of decline are London and perhaps surprisingly, Harlow, Cambridge, Gosport and Swindon. In South Wales, Swansea has a small but significant gain in an area that otherwise shows general high tech decline.
