My 2 cents: the only categories of “real” value are human life (measured in time, i.e., wages) and non-renewable resources (land, minerals, etc.) Building buildings takes a lot of both, so it is a “real” expenditure. Software is more-or-less a service good that only transfers money from one party to another. An implication of the US divesting it’s manufacturing capacity to China is that there’s a lot more “just” moving money around and a lot less building “real” value.