What won’t Brandon Johnson tax ?

[Caveira]

Rampant spending on illegals.  And now this … it’s an abc7 article … fund more and more and more things.   Where does the funding end.   I hear do more with less in corporate America every day.  Government needs to hear this 

MAYOR JOHNSON PROPOSES SOCIAL MEDIA TAX TO FUND MENTAL HEALTH CLINICS IN 2026 BUDGET

 

 

By Craig Wall

Updated 2 hours ago

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson presented a 2026 budget proposal to the full City Council during their morning meeting Thursday.

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Mayor Brandon Johnson rolled out his progressive budget for 2026 on Thursday as the city faces more than a billion-dollar deficit.
 

ABC7 Chicago is now streaming 24/7. Click here to watch

Ahead of his budget address, the mayor spoke surrounded by community organizations and elected leaders about the "Protecting Chicago Budget."

"It acknowledges a harsh reality that I think, that we all can agree on. We are living in unprecedented times," Johnson said.

A budget forecast released this summer projects a $1.15 billion deficit for the city, driven in part by the end of federal pandemic aid, and uncertainty over Chicago Public Schools pension payments.
 

 

 

Council members have until the end of the year to negotiate changes. The budget needs 26 votes for it to pass.

Johnson also called for a one-year hiring freeze that exempts public safety and other essential services.

There were also frequent jabs at the Trump administration, which the mayor blamed for some of the city's financial problems.
 

No new taxes or fees for Chicagoans

The mayor's proposed budget does not impose any new property taxes or fees on Chicagoans.
 

 

 

To avoid placing an "additional financial strain on working people," the mayor also proposed the abolition of the grocery tax and reducing the motor vehicle lessor tax from $2.75 to $0.50 per rental period.
 

Social media tax to fund mental health programs

The mayor's budget proposes two new special revenue funds for mental health and community safety.

The programs would be funded by adding a tax fee on social media companies called Social Media Amusement & Responsibility Tax, or SMART.

Money collected from the companies would fund "free mental health clinics throughout Chicago and the expansion of mental health crisis response teams," the mayor said.
 

 

 

The tax would charge social media companies 50 cents per active user over 100,000 in Chicago. The mayor's office expects the proposed tax to generate $31 million.

"And just like we tax other addictive vices that are bad for our health, like nicotine and tobacco, it is far past time we treat social media companies the same way," Johnson said.

"Well, a social media tax has been challenged in many other states. The Supreme Court has looked at these and said these are First Amendment issues and struck down states' chances to try to tax these," 32nd Ward Ald. Scott Waguespack said.

The budget also creates a $100 million Community Safety Fund to increase funding for youth diversion and employment programs.
 

Taxing large corporations and the 'ultra-rich'

As a direct response to the Trump administration's tax cut for large corporations, the mayor proposed to implement new taxes and fees on some of Chicago's wealthiest people and corporations.
 

 

 

One of the proposed fees is a "yacht tax,"' which the mayor said would brings the rate for boat-mooring at city harbors into alignment with historical rates and the rate of parking.

Two other new fees include a "vacant building fee," which is a renewal fee to recover costs, incentivize development and reduce blight and taxes on big tech companies through an increase in the Personal Property Lease Transaction Tax rate.

"We are asking the top 3% of the absolute largest corporations in our city, those who have seen tremendous success and exceedingly high profits, to chip in so that we can build a safer city for all of Chicago," Johnson said.

The Community Safety Surcharge would apply to companies with more than 100 employees.

It would charge $21 per employee per month.

It would generate $100 million in revenue

That would pay for things like violence prevention programs and summer youth jobs
 

$1 billion Tax Increment Financing surplus

The mayor said it's marking the largest TIF surplus in the history of the city.

The surplus is expected to support Chicago Public Libraries, financial relief to Chicago Public Schools, Chicago Park District and City Colleges of Chicago, the mayor said.
 

RELATED: Chicago Police Department asked to come up with $98M in cuts amid city budget crisis

Some alders say Johnson's proposals may not pass muster.

And the ideas also drew sharp backlash from the business community.

Local and state business groups blasted the head tax plan, along with the increase in the cloud computing tax.

"The best way to get rid of fiscal deficits is have new jobs, and the head tax and the cloud tax are job-killing taxes that will hurt businesses of every size and sector in Chicago," said Jack Lavin, president and of the CEO Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.

The Progressive Caucus praised the head tax and other revenue ideas.

"There's economic warfare being put on our cities. Trump administration is taking away funds. They're laying off our workers. They're hurting our economies. That means cities have to find new solutions to how we fund our essential services," said 49th Ward Ald. Maria Hadden, chair of the Progressive Caucus.

But what alders did not see in the budget was money to pay for the new fire department contract.

So the budget discussions in the coming weeks could be contentious.

Edited 19 hours ago by Caveira

[Lipdrag]

Illegal aliens.

[Wrestleknownothing]

I have a hard time giving a crap about taxing Meta and Twitter. 

[Lipdrag]

3 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

I have a hard time giving a crap about taxing Meta and Twitter. 

First they came for Meta and Twitter . . . 

[Caveira]

5 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

I have a hard time giving a crap about taxing Meta and Twitter. 

Chicago is among the highest taxed city in all of America.  There are some that are close / worse but they’re crazy with their taxes.  Stop wasting and expanding programs and expecting everyone else to pay for your crap.  

stop blowing billions on illegals and expecting us to pay more and more and more for them 

[Wrestleknownothing]

6 minutes ago, Lipdrag said:

First they came for Meta and Twitter . . . 

Companies pay taxes all the time. Well, they should, but sometimes don't. Meta's effective tax rate is below 12%.

[Wrestleknownothing]

6 minutes ago, Caveira said:

Chicago is among the highest taxed city in all of America.  There are some that are close / worse but they’re crazy with their taxes.  Stop wasting and expanding programs and expecting everyone else to pay for your crap.  

stop blowing billions on illegals and expecting us to pay more and more and more for them 

This isn't  a tax on Chicagoans. 

[Wrestleknownothing]

The real question is how would the city even do this?

[Caveira]

1 minute ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

The real question is how would the city even do this?

This and it’s endless.  The $21 per employee per company over 100 is going to be passed on to Chicago people.  Were discussed ad nauseam businesses leaving for tax reasons.  They tax bags at the grocery store.  $0.10 cents a bag.   They need to look at the nonsense they spend $ on vs more taxes.  White collar people and companies are leaving.  It’s a house of cards 

[Caveira]

15 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

The real question is how would the city even do this?

This guys a proven tax cheat + a billionaire.   15% of his “income” is gambling wins.  Sure.    But raise our taxes 

 

[Wrestleknownothing]

3 minutes ago, Caveira said:

This guys a proven tax cheat + a billionaire.   15% of his “income” is gambling wins.  Sure.    But raise our taxes 

 

Once again, the proposal does not raise your taxes

[Caveira]

22 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

Once again, the proposal does not raise your taxes

Taxes to businesses are absorbed by the business or passed on to the consumer.  I’m not sure.  You seem to know.  Let me know 

[Wrestleknownothing]

2 minutes ago, Caveira said:

Taxes to businesses are absorbed by the business or passed on to the consumer.  I’m not sure.  You seem to know.  Let me know 

You are not a consumer on Twitter. You are a set of eyes. What do you currently pay for Twitter?

[Caveira]

10 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

You are not a consumer on Twitter. You are a set of eyes. What do you currently pay for Twitter?

Who is a consumer of any business over 100 employees. ?   Amazon.  Whole Foods?  Jewel ?   Mariano’s ?  Walmart?  Target?   Banks?  These are proposals.  
 

stop spending Rampant $ on nonsense and you don’t need new taxes every year.  They already raised my property taxes twice in the last few years.  City stickers cost a fortune.  Plate stickers cost a fortune.  All are increasing.  You never comment on rampant spending.  Just your dislike for meta or Twitter.

why do I pay 0.10 a bag st the grocery store 

Edited 17 hours ago by Caveira

[Viratas]

This clown, "The Squad", Tampon Timmy, Newsome... the level of pure stupidity is astounding.  I don't even mean thier politics,  these people are a special kind of dum dum.

[Wrestleknownothing]

13 minutes ago, Caveira said:

Who is a consumer of any business over 100 employees. ?   Amazon.  Whole Foods?  Jewel ?   Mariano’s ?  Walmart?  Target?   Banks?  These are proposals.  
 

stop spending Rampant $ on nonsense and you don’t need new taxes every year.  They already raised my property taxes twice in the last few years.  City stickers cost a fortune.  Plate stickers cost a fortune.  All are increasing.  You never comment on rampant spending.  Just your dislike for meta or Twitter.

why do I pay 0.10 a bag st the grocery store 

Are you kidding?

You do not know if you are a consumer of businesses you pay for, but you are convinced you are a consumer of something you get for free in exchange for your attention. 

The consumers on Twitter are the advertisers. And it is you they are consuming. 

[Caveira]

4 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

Are you kidding?

You do not know if you are a consumer of businesses you pay for, but you are convinced you are a consumer of something you get for free in exchange for your attention. 

The consumers on Twitter are the advertisers. And it is you they are consuming. 

I don’t care about Twitter.  Which part of that did I say I cared about.  
 

Fun fact.  They will have an impossible time enforcing that.  Or if they can they just will not employee people here as much. Either way it’s not good for the state or Chicago.   
 

do you like excessive taxes ?   You dodged every single comment about the governments rampant spending vs additional taxes 

 

white collar people are leaving Illinois and Chicago In droves.  Are twitter employees likely to be white collar or blue collar ?

Edited 17 hours ago by Caveira

[Wrestleknownothing]

2 minutes ago, Caveira said:

I don’t care about Twitter.  Which part of that did I say I cared about.  
 

Fun fact.  They will have an impossible time enforcing that.  Or if they can they just will not employee people here as much. Either way it’s not good for the state or Chicago.   
 

do you like excessive taxes ?   You dodged every single comment about the governments rampant spending vs additional taxes 

 

white collar people are leaving Illinois and Chicago In droves.  Are twitter employees likely to be white collar or blue collar ?

So what was your point of starting a thread about Chicago proposing a tax on Twitter and including a long article about taxing Twitter?

Or was that just an excuse to bitch about other stuff?

[Caveira]

4 minutes ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

So what was your point of starting a thread about Chicago proposing a tax on Twitter and including a long article about taxing Twitter?

Or was that just an excuse to bitch about other stuff?

As I’ve stared it isn’t just Twitter.  But whatever.  Go on hating on Elon or whatever boss.  Americans pay to much in taxes today.   And it keeps getting worse 

[red viking]

Isn't it pretty easy to move to a new city? 

[Caveira]

4 minutes ago, red viking said:

Isn't it pretty easy to move to a new city? 

Yes. I am leaving when my kids get to college boss.  Few more years and I’m out.  Like many / the rest of the white collar high tax paying people.  

[ionel]

1 hour ago, Caveira said:

This guys a proven tax cheat + a billionaire.   15% of his “income” is gambling wins.  Sure.    But raise our taxes 

 

I am ok with Prizker gambling and paying taxes on his winnings.  

[Caveira]

2 minutes ago, ionel said:

I am ok with Prizker gambling and paying taxes on his winnings.  

A lot of people are wondering are those real gambling winnings or something else.  But I do agree he should pay on his winnings.  If true. 
 

if I won 1.5 million at black jack or poker I would have a more concrete story.  
 

But ya. 

[ionel]

12 minutes ago, Caveira said:

 

if I won 1.5 million at black jack or poker I would have a more concrete story.  
 

Maybe that was the best he could come up with while sitting on one of his dozen s#i!!ers.   

[Scouts Honor]

12 hours ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

This isn't  a tax on Chicagoans. 

 

11 hours ago, red viking said:

Isn't it pretty easy to move to a new city? 

isn't it pretty easy to move to a new country? 

you keep saying you wont'