There is another twist on this, which is that once you have information technology and the cost of long-distance communication is very cheap, it's very hard for any new technology to be captured by a particular region. Because other regions can quickly get all the latest stuff from the original region and do it. So it creates a more competitive environment for everything. And so it's harder to concentrate in a region the technological rents that accrue from new technology, because everybody gets to do the new stuff right away.
Now, this isn't necessarily bad. It lowers the cost of new stuff. It's good for consumers. It's just bad for the concentration of wealth based on technological rents and profits in a particular region. But that's not necessarily bad for consumers either. Why do we need wealth concentrated in a particular region? The equal distribution of wealth is good for a lot of people. So this is not necessarily a bad thing. It has occurred to me that the emergence of information technology in the form of really cheap communications probably changes the nature of the game of trying to get ahead by concentrating any kind of innovation in a particular region. It probably just makes it more difficult.