Plainview Meat Plant, Texas

This beef processing plant, located between Amarillo and Lubbock, closed a few years ago, after more than four decades of operation, idling more than 2,300 workers in a town of 22,000 people. Cargill put it up for sale in 2015, and it remains shuttered. Though severe droughts in the years before the plant closed contributed to a decrease in cattle in the area, the fact is that beef consumption is decreasing in the country, being replaced by chicken and other sources of protein. When the plant closed in 2013, Texas had the lowest number of cattle since 1967, and nationwide the fewest since 1951.