whereas many secondary cities were able to economically specialize in certain products and develop a comparative advantage at the national level over time they proved to be overly dependent on vertical specialization which characterized their economic organization economies of scale worked within a framework of vertical specialization but when these industries were challenged by lower labor costs in latin america and later in asia they were unable to compete deindustrialization first hit north america and europe and later latin america as jobs moved to china and other african and asian countries