“I’d have Cat building a factory in Detroit by their own choice.”
Cities exist because of the mutual availability of labor and employers. Detroit has run off all the employers with bad tax policy, which in the national picture has also run numerous US companies abroad. But the labor side of the equation is a motivated good quality work force. I don’t think that exists in Detroit. What is left are the takers. The makers left long ago. Those who would happily take the jobs are not qualified to do them. For example, literacy in Detroit is at third world levels.
Not all of them. I believe Detroit engines are still made there.