The roots of inequality: California agriculture and the seeding of Silicon Valley’s technology economy, 1935–1965

In the years immediately following World War II, California’s Santa Clara Valley was an agricultural breadbasket to the world. A mere 30 years later, the Santa Clara Valley would be known as ‘Silicon Valley’, and would be the most technologically productive region on the planet. This transition from an agricultural economy to an urbanized, technological economy came to be seen as curious, or even quaint. But in fact, this period of rapid suburban development out of an agricultural landscape laid the foundation for the housing and labour markets that came to characterize the contemporary Silicon Valley. This article reveals how the years following World War II set the stage for what Silicon Valley would become today. It argues that the roots of Silicon Valley’s current housing and labour system were based in the agricultural regime of the immediate post-World War II period and the subsequent Cold War economy.