Yes, the position of the link in the page layout is a ranking factor in Google’s algorithm, according to Google’s former spokesperson, Matt Cutts. Contextual links (i.e. links within a paragraph of text) will carry more weight than footer links.

“We do reserve the right to treat links in footers a little bit differently. For example, if something is in a footer it might not carry the same editorial weight […] Whereas something that’s in, you know, an actual paragraph of text is a little more likely to be an editorial link, so we do reserve the right to treat those links differently in terms of how we consider them for relevance, how we consider them for reputation, how much we trust them all those sorts of things”- source