Geographic distribution of talent in urban Mexico and its expression in patterns of specialization and / or diversification.

The geographic distribution of Mexican highly qualified labor force, its expression in forms of specialization, diversification or complementarity and their impact in the performance of cities are relevant issues, from a public policy and an academic point of view. For the analysis of the geographic distribution of human capital (hc) in Mexico we depart from a functional structure derived by the interactions of 56 cities placed in 16 regional networks. We approach these as labor markets and people engaged in knowledge-intensive (ki) occupations as part of their high-level hc. We classify cities and networks by the relevance of their ki occupation structure in three types: balanced hubs, specialized hubs and emergent specialization. We also approach hc accumulation in terms of educational achievement and its evolution overtime and classify cities as outstanding, at risk, pre-emergent and deteriorated. We find that, as aggregates, diversified hubs are an ‘at a risk’ position, specialized hubs of cities show an emergent outstanding position but the corresponding networks are ‘at risk’; and the emerging aggregate with the greater shortage of highly educated hc, show a great dynamism in its formation. We finally analyze the association of these types with indicators of social and economic performance of these urban areas