Subject: Review of "The Atlas of Arkansas" (long)

From: [email-masked] (Leon Tqylor)
Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1993 22:39:12 GMT

The Atlas of Arkansas, by Richard M. Smith.  Fayetteville,
Ark. 72701: The University of Arkansas Press, 1989.  226 pp.,
color maps, index, bibliography.  ISBN 1-55728-048-7 (pbk). 
About $20 in pbk.

     For today's pioneers, a desktop computer is a Conestoga.  A
few years ago, Richard Smith, a geography professor at the
University of Arkansas, had the bright idea of fashioning a state
atlas on the microcomputer.  No need for the apocryphal room full
of wizened geographers, perched on stools and hunched like monks
over their drawing easels.  One could make an atlas on the PC
cheaply and update it easily.  
     The state solons kicked in some money; AutoDesk donated its
overpriced design package, AutoCAD; Rix SoftWorks gave away an
art package, EGA Paint 2005.  (You read it right -- EGA, as in
Enhanced Graphic Adapter.  This project was conceived in the
antediluvian Eighties.)  Smith printed the maps on an IRIS
Graphics 3024 Color Ink Jet Printer.
     The result: A book that appeals to mind, eye and pocketbook. 
With more than 100 figures sharply etched in color, "The Atlas of
Arkansas" sells for about half the price of a mediocre brunch in
New Orleans.  If Smith sticks to his schedule, an update will
appear next year.  I will be first in line.
     An atlas is a superior form of the detective novel.  Smith
notes, for instance, that one of every three Americans lives
within 500 miles of Arkansas.  Such a central location (muses the
armchair sleuth) should provide an ace in the hole for boosters
of the Land of Opportunity.  In this Highway Age, when
manufacturers produce in one plant and distribute from another,
market access helps determine where the plants locate.    
     That once was a sunny prospect for Arkansas.  Manufacturing
took off in the Forties, when production of weapons and aluminum
boomed.  Employment grew steadily -- quadrupled, in fact -- from
the Forties into the Seventies.  
     Today manufacturing provides one of every four nonfarm jobs
in Arkansas.  That emphasis is unusual in a national economy that
is shifting -- some would say it is sliding precipitously --
toward services.  In the US, manufacturing provides just one of
every six nonfarm jobs.
     Still, the view from the watchtower reveals storm warnings. 
By 1980, manufacturing was no longer adding jobs in Arkansas. 
The problem was national.  High energy prices of the 1970s,
courtesy of OPEC, discouraged factories from investing in
expansion.  So did the high interest rates of the early 1980s,
courtesy of the Fed.  A strong dollar chased US manufacturers out
of export markets.  
     What goes up must come down (a little):  Eventually energy
prices, interest rates and exchange rates did fall.  But by then,
US factories were either moving overseas or substituting machines
for labor.
     That tale is especially sobering for Arkansas, which relies
more than most states on manufacturing for jobs.  In 1990, the
unemployment rate was 6.9 percent in Arkansas, several notches
higher than the U.S. average of 5.5 percent.  Annual pay rose
just .8 of a percent in Arkansas that year, the smallest gain in
the U.S.  
     Evidently the state needs more and better-paying jobs.  It
probably can't create many jobs on its own, though.  Arkansas is
too poor to provide much of a market for new products: Its median
family income ($14,641 in 1979) virtually ties it with
Mississippi as the poorest state in the Union.  Perhaps its best
bet is to lure factories that produce for regional markets.
Indeed, almost two-thirds of the manufacturing firms in Arkansas
are owned out of state.  
     What must Arkansas do to attract factories?  Judging from
Smith's atlas, it should take a long hard look at its
transportation system.  It is one of 10 states that is unlucky
enough to have completed its alloted number of interstate miles
(just 541).  The southeast third has no commercial airport; the
third largest city, Pine Bluff, has no scheduled air service.  No
railroads -- and few US highways -- reach the Ozarks and
Ouachitas.  It is no surprise that the southeast and the
highlands have few manufacturing jobs.  But I digress.
     Smith's atlas ranges from grain sorghum to newspapers, from
presidential elections to state parks. You will learn here, if
you didn't already know (and I didn't), that Arkansas is the only
state that produces diamonds.  You can dig for them at the Crater
of Diamonds State Park.  One visitor found a 5.58-carat rock in
1984; it is high time for another lucky strike.  
     If (like me) you think that it's too hot to dig, then you
may prefer to make a capuccino, put up your feet -- and mine this
atlas for nuggets of gold.

Leon Taylor
Economics Department
Tulane University
New Orleans La 70118-5698
[email-masked]
(voice) 504-862-8340
(fax)   504-865-5869