There's a couple of problems with that argument. Apple is a great Silicon Valley success story, but they don't make products in Silicon Valley. They design them

There's a couple of problems with that argument. Apple is a great Silicon Valley success story, but they don't make products in Silicon Valley. They design them there, but they are manufactured elsewhere. In its heyday, Silicon Valley used to make things. Tangible things. Manufacturing companies not only provide direct labor employment opportunities, but they also create 2-3 jobs in the local economy for every direct labor position. The hardware companies of yesteryear made products that had a compounding value in the economy. Test and measurement equipment, processors, workstations, etc., were put to use making other products that had value, hence the compounding effect. I'm sure Apple products have a compounding value effect, but a company like Facebook probably doesn't, at least to the degree the old SV companies and their products did.