Chicago Politics

12.9.25 Mayor Brandon Johnson Press Availability Opening Remarks

Description

Mayor Brandon Johnson’s opening presentation at his 12.9.25 press availability.

Transcript

0:16 Well, good morning. It's been a while. I miss you all. Thank you all for being patient, as you always are, with us. I want to walk you all through a new iteration of the community safety surcharge that we began to socialize with council members on yesterday. Essentially, this version would isolate to an even greater extent. This revenue-generating proposal would extract resources from the largest companies in the city of Chicago.

0:56 These are companies that have more than 500 employees. We would raise the rate per month to $33 on roughly 175 companies, which we project would raise roughly $82 million. What this fund would do, it would continue to drive violence down in the city of Chicago,

1:26 ensuring that our community violence intervention workers are supported. that we can continue our youth employment and diversion programs, services for survivors of domestic violence and gender-based violence, and, of course, mental health care for our first responders. What types of companies would this impact? Well, we're talking about the largest corporations, of course, in the city. We are not talking about your local retail shops, however.

2:00 We are not talking about your mom and pop restaurants. We are talking about the companies who have done exceedingly well in this current economic climate. Some of these names you might recognize, J.P. Morgan, Walmart, Accenture. J.P. Morgan, for example, brought in $57 billion in profit last year. And keep in mind, you all, they received $11 billion in additional profit from the 2024 Trump tax breaks, which, as I've been saying, was the largest upward transfer of wealth in our nation's history.

2:40 We're talking about banks like Citigroup, which made $11 billion last year, and companies like Mondelez, the world's largest snack company, reaching more than 150 countries. Don't misunderstand me. We are certainly proud of Chicago and Chicago being home to many of these world-renowned powerhouse companies. But $30 a month is not going to change their bottom line.

3:13 What they prioritize is a talent pool, which Chicago certainly has. But to attract more people, we need to continue to drive crime and violence down. Our work is nowhere near from being complete. If we look at a company like Bank of America, for example, they made $27 billion in profit last year, An additional $4 billion from the Trump tax cuts. The community safety surcharge would account for roughly .0008% of their annual revenue.

3:47 That's less than 1,000th of a percent. Another myth that we need to dispel is the idea that this would be a, quote, job killer, unquote. Let's remember you all, we have this tax in place for more than 40 years. When you ask what city has this worked in, well, it worked in Chicago. And we know that it can work again. When we look at Chicago employment trends over time on the chart on the left,

4:22 we see that Chicago's employment trends track closely with the national changes in employment over the past 35 years. When employment goes up nationally, it certainly goes up in Chicago. When it falls, Nationally, it also falls in Chicago. We do not find a sustained explosion. I'm sorry, we do not again find a sustained explosion in jobs after the repeal. In fact, it is difficult to tell where, on this chart, the repeal even happens because the trend remains constant.

4:59 On the right, we see Chicago's comparative employment growth over the national average for the past 20 years. What you'll see is the period while we still had the corporate head tax had stronger job growth compared to the national average than the periods after repeal. This cuts directly against the idea that there is any correlation whatsoever between local marginal taxes and overall economic growth.

5:34 And when we look at the cost of the repeal, we see that Chicagoans have lost out on more than $240 million in revenue that could have funded city services, that could have helped solve our structural deficit, that could have kept mental health clinics open. Instead, Chicagoans got higher property taxes, more regressive fines and cuts to services, while large corporations essentially got a tax cut.

6:08 When you look at the combined tax rates of major cities, accounting for all the relevant direct and indirect taxes, you can see that Chicago has one of the lowest corporate tax rate of any major city in the country. we have the lowest of the three largest cities and the fourth lowest of the top four municipal economies. So, in summary, number one, the new model we are putting forward, responding to what we have heard from alders and residents,

6:44 focuses on just the top few hundred companies. Number two, the new model accounts for less than a thousandth of a percent for these companies. Number three, a job boom failed to materialize. Number four, the repeal cost Chicagoans hundreds of millions of dollars that was made up for in property taxes, regressive funds, I'm sorry, regressive fines and cuts.

7:21 And finally, contrary to what you will read in the editorial boards, Chicago lags other major cities and taxing corporations to fund vital services for our residents. I do appreciate the special attention to today's presentation.

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