Even though manufacturing capital is less of a force in US urban politics than in the past, the industrial sector has certainly not disappeared. The world is more industrialized than ever, and the United States still produces plenty of goods. In fact, manufacturing remains the most important sector of the US economy in terms of total output.73 What has happened is a major geographical reorganization in production and distribution. Over the past seventy-five years, the United States has gone through three major industrial shifts: a movement of parts and assembly plants from older northern cities to newer southern cities and rural areas from roughly 1947 to 1973; a deeper set of national and international production relocations from 1973 through the 1980s and 1990s; and finally, in the 1990s and 2000s, an expansion of logistics clusters that coordinate the flow of goods into and out of population centers around the country.

As a result of these relocations, much of the United States’ industrial activity today takes place outside the big cities: giant food processing plants in exurban areas; energy extraction centers on Appalachian mountaintops and Gulf coast outposts; and, most importantly for big cities, growing import/export processing zones in major metropolitan areas.75 These distribution hubs employ enormous numbers of workers but, because of their demand for fast access out of central city traffic, their sprawling size, and the high cost and regulation of central city land, they tend to be located outside the political boundaries of the main cities they serve.76 Crucially, this means they make fewer land- and housing-based demands of city planners in places like New York, Los Angeles and Chicago than centrally located urban factory owners would. When these logistics clusters are located inside the political boundaries of major cities—like New York’s Hunts Point Market and JFK Airport—they often operate on public land, meaning the companies that depend on them are not particularly bothered by the cost of urban land and housing (particularly if they assume their workers will live in cheaper suburbs or exurbs). In fact, since publicly operated logistics clusters are largely financed through municipal bonds, city governments may see inducing gentrification—something bond buyers generally interpret as a sign of urban health and future wealth—as key to financing this increasingly important form of urban industry.