More than half of Silicon Valley's start ups of the last decade were founded by at least one immigrant, according to Benjamin Pimentel, a staff writer for the San Francisco Chronicle. Citing a Duke University study, the article says that nationwide, about one-fourth of start ups have immigrant founders.
I guess we should call this in-sourcing. This should come as no surprise. I believe the better parts of America's history are filled with stories of people who came here because this is supposed to be the land of opportunity, and they took advantage of those immigrants. This survey is well-timed. The US Congress next week will take up changes in US immigration laws and many feel it portends to be an ugly discussion.
This issue is relevant to Global Neighborhoods because technology may make it less necessary for the world's best and brightest visionary technologists to cluster here in Silicon Valley. In short, the flattening world may mean that the Andy Grove, Vinod Khosla and Sergey Brin, Alexander Hamilton, Andrew Carnegie of the future may not have to come here, robbing America of its ability to attract so many of the world's best and brightest.
