&gt; Factories usually push <i>down</i> the value of land. Who wants to be next to a smokestack?<p>Factory workers. Then service workers who sell their food and cut their hair. Then doctors and nurses and police and firefighters and so on who are needed wherever people are concentrated. How do you think places go from being an empty field to a town?<p>&gt; Which is all very well, except there basically isn&#x27;t anybody who doesn&#x27;t care about location and attracts investment. Location is important for everybody.<p>Then why do Boeing and Ford and GE build their factories in rural areas instead of in Manhattan?