JB Pritzker on the Fight Over AI, Housing, and Taxes

22:57They don't even want it here. Yeah. Let me back up and just say, you know, there's a little bit of a difference between data centers that we were attracting several years ago and now the AI data centers. These are like massive facilities, right? And I'm proud of the fact that, you know, Illinois, because of our geography, because of the fact that we, I don't know if anybody knows here, that we have 80 % of the United States' fresh water is on the shores of or underneath or surrounding in our rivers, Illinois. I mean, 80 % of the United States' fresh water, right? Including, of course, the Great Lakes.

23:35And it's 20 % of the world's fresh water. Nobody ever took full advantage of the fact that that's a commodity that we all should be valuing and protecting for the state of Illinois. So let's start with just a recognition of that and a recognition that we also have been a net energy exporter in the state. About 53 percent of all the electricity that gets created in the state of Illinois is nuclear with the largest nuclear state in the country. Now, there were years ago when people were like, oh, my God, that's a terrible thing. I think mostly today people would say we need more electricity. How are we going to get it fast enough?

24:11And of course, we've expanded all the renewable energy sources that we can as fast as we can. But nuclear is the best way to get baseload energy that we need. So to your point, though, data centers are sucking a lot of the electricity and water. And it's not just Illinois data centers. There are data centers all over the country that are doing this, and particularly the AI, big AI data centers that are going up. And, you know, you saw, like, in Pennsylvania, they're restarting Three Mile Island just for a data center. And I think that my guess is that's going to be a reasonably unpopular thing to have done.

24:53What I've done here, and I proposed it back in February, is that we had, just like we do in a lot of industries, we had tax credits available for people to build data centers. I do want to point out that data centers are really great job creators in the construction side of things. But once they're built, they really don't employ a lot of people. But what they do do is pay property taxes in the local area, which brings down property taxes for others. I'm going through all this because what we now need to do is take a pause. And that's what I proposed back in February when I gave my State of the State speech.

25:27We should pause our data center tax credits. We ought to take an assessment of where we are. And very importantly, we should force data centers to bring their own electricity and make sure that they're paying their fair share if they're coming to the state of Illinois.

25:45We agree on that. I just want to ask you about housing. So you recently had proposed a bill called the Build Plan. And the idea was to bring down housing prices by essentially giving the state the power to override these local zoning policies, if I'm getting that right. And the bill didn't pass. and I look at that, to me, that's a great plan to reduce the cost of housing in America. We've talked about this a lot, Econ 101, you need to increase the supply if you want to get prices down. It sounds like you tried to do that and it didn't work and it didn't pan out. What are your takeaways from build not going through and what does the future of housing policy in America look like in a way that is actually effective and actually brings prices down?

26:37I'm glad you asked because, you know, when I ran for office, my my slogan for my campaign was think big. Now, some of that was because. But but it was also because we needed big change in the state. And I talked about some of the challenges we had. And I have not stopped thinking big or acting in a way that that will change the direction of the state in a positive way. One of the things, of course, that we need in the state of Illinois, it's the biggest expense that everybody in this room and everybody in the state has, which is housing. If you want to address affordability, and that's sort of the buzzword of the day, but really, if you want to bring costs down for people, you've got to make it more affordable for people to buy a home or rent a home, rent an apartment, et cetera.

27:22So here's the other thing. We balance the budget every year. It's not an easy thing, especially in this moment when Donald Trump has taken away$8 billion from the state of Illinois,$8 billion. Our total budget is$55 billion. When you take$8 billion away, it's impossible to replace. So let's be clear. If we want to address this, we can't do it by just writing checks so that we can just create a bunch of housing and give it away. Yes, we need affordable housing for low-income people who otherwise can't afford housing. We absolutely have been investing in that. We're not going to stop doing that.

28:01But what we need now also is housing for working-class people, for working families, for middle-class people who can't buy a home. I mean, now what's the average age to buy a first-time home? 40 years old. It used to be 30. It's now 40 years old. People want to start a family, can't afford to buy a house and, you know, plant their family somewhere where there's a good school and so on. So how do you do that? If you don't have a lot of money to build housing or just subsidize people buying housing, how do you go about that? Well, one way to do that is remove some of the barriers to make it less expensive to build homes and make sure that you're providing just some basic down payment assistance for people in a world where interest rates are very high compared to where they were before.

28:46Anyway, they're six and a half percent roughly for a mortgage right now. And the average home in Illinois costs about$400 ,000 across. Sorry, in the city of Chicago, about$400 ,000 across the state. It's about$320 ,000 to buy a home. People can't buy a home anymore. And so we want to make it a little easier. And the only way to do that is let's remove the barriers. So what's an example of how you remove barriers? Well, one way to do that is make sure that in a neighborhood where, you know, over the years, redlining, for example, has put a bunch of regulations in place that really haven't been removed and they haven't been called out for the fact that they were about redlining, have kept people from building like a two flat, a duplex where otherwise there was only a single family home allowed.

29:35What about if you own a home and you have a garage and you'd like to put your parents in the, they're getting older and they'd like them to be on your property, but they'd like their own home and you want to convert your garage into a home. It's near impossible in most places in the state of Illinois just to do that. And it may take you a couple of years to get permitted to do anything like that if it is allowed. So what we're trying to do is just make it a little bit easier. We're not talking about building, you know, 50 condos next to a single family home block. That's not what we're doing. And yet that is the misinformation that people who are opposed to this have been putting out.

30:13So, look, it may take us it clearly is going to take more than the session that we were just in to convince people this is the right way to go. But we are making progress in this regard. And the right thing to do is add a few homes everywhere in the state. We need about 240 ,000 more homes in the state by 2030. We probably have a shortage of about 130 ,000 right now. So you can't do that quickly unless you do something significant, thinking big. And that's what the build plan is. We got about two pieces of it passed. There are about four that didn't get passed in this session. But I've worked on things for a couple of years to get them done.

30:52We just banned cell phones during the school day in classes.

31:01And that took us a couple of years. So sometimes you got to work on something more than just a few months. To what extent do you think states and cities should continue to subsidize billionaire families that own sports franchises?

31:18I'm sorry. I didn't hear anything before sports franchises. What did you ask? I'll phrase the question a different way. Bears question mark.

31:34Who here is a Chicago Bears fan? So, me too, and when the Bears showed up about... Who's a fan of balancing the budget? Sorry, couldn't resist. It's only your audience, by the way, where people are really thinking about that. I really appreciate it. That's right. in the state of illinois balancing budgets it's actually a big deal isn't it um so i look i i mean i love the chicago bears and they showed up in springfield about a couple of years ago um and and spent i think a couple years trying to lobby the legislature and were unsuccessful um and the reason is you know things have changed you know since many years ago when there was a you know, Stadium Finance Authority created that created Soldier Field and created what I would call Comiskey.

32:24I know it's rate now or something like that. Guaranteed rate field Comiskey for the White Sox. You know, years ago, it was very popular for politicians to build and pay for stadiums for sports teams. It's not very popular right now, especially in a moment when people aren't able to get fed because SNAP's being taken away, Medicaid and their health care is being taken away. And we have a lot of other priorities. I'm not suggesting that we don't love the Chicago Bears or that we don't want to help a business in the state. And that is a private business owned by a private family. We do. We want more business, more jobs.

33:02We want to help people come to or expand in the state. But honestly, in the priority of things in Springfield and things that matter in the state, it wasn't the number one priority. So nevertheless, I thought it was important for us to put forward something that would help the Bears stay in the state. I think they want to stay in the state, but I also think that, you know, that it's a team that has struggled, I think, to make investments. And so they're looking for others to help them make investments like this. What I'm unwilling to do is spend taxpayer money to build a stadium for a private

33:46business. But incentives, incentives like, for example, we do this for lots of companies. You need infrastructure. You need roads. You need sewers. When you're going to build a new factory or build a new headquarters, those are all things that government is supposed to do. And so those are things that we talked to the bears about doing and giving them the ability to build a privately owned stadium. That was something that we put a plan together for. But, you know, look, it's not my job to go lobby for the Bears. They've got to go get the support for their staying in the state and for all the things that they want.

34:24And I think they were not all that successful at getting that done. I say all that with the desire that, you know, the Senate passed a bill that would allow them to stay in the state. The House did not pass it because I think, frankly, midnight was a deadline. Some of you may know the way the legislature works, but you have to get supermajorities after midnight on May 31st. So we call that May 32nd. They passed midnight. They weren't able to get it in the House, and they didn't have a supermajority of votes to get it done. We'll see what happens. There may be time to get that done this summer.

34:57But the key thing for me is protect the taxpayers and make sure that we're helping a business grow in the state. Stay with us.

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36:32We're back with Prof G Markets. Should you decide to run for federal office, I think something that might be a liability is that when someone asks you a question, you're thoughtful and you add color and context. So I'm going to help you out here and we're going to try and do social media tick-tockable answers. OK. So I want to do two lightning rounds and one will be a policy lightning round and one will be more of a personal lightning round. Make sense, Ed? That makes sense. Okay, so I'm going to talk about a policy, and I just want to get a quick response. Wow.

37:11This is what it's like. Imagine working for him. Yeah, I really don't. It's pretty tough.

37:18Yeah, things are rough for you. He's like 14 years old. Anyways, federally mandated$25 an hour minimum wage. I raised the minimum wage in the state of Illinois to$15 from$8.25. I do think it's got to be a level playing field across the country. So if we're going to raise the minimum wage, which we should do, federal minimum wage,$7.25. I know you want a shorter answer. Federal minimum wage,$7.25. You can't survive on that. So$25 seems like fair and reasonable if it's across the board.

37:54lower medicaid eligibility or medicare excuse me i forget which one two years basically single payer socialized national health care coverage well you put a lot of words in there i mean we need about socialized but socialized medicine yeah okay okay all right that you're putting a perspective on it what i would say is everybody should have a doctor we should have universal health care in this country and and that there are several ways to do that single-payer medicare for all um or a system that has private and public like a public option for example but it's got to be a federal public option we looked at it for the state to create a public option and couldn't figure out how to make it work fiscally for the state to do it no state's been able to do that but it could work nationally.

38:49Mandatory national service. I really do, yeah. You know, I really do believe that everybody should do some service. And I think going forward, when you think about the effects that AI is going to have on the economy, that people are going to have to learn what we've traditionally called vocational training. And we should just provide that training for everybody. and the opportunity to go in the military if that's a choice that people want to make. But some choices that people could make at age 18 when they're graduating. Because I think in the end, you know, AI is not going to replace things. I do not believe AI is going to replace a plumber.

39:31And they're not going to replace, you know, people who construct buildings. So I do think that having some kind of opportunity for people that, you know, Now, it's just like you're required to go to school. This should be in that vein. Last one on the policy side, alternative minimum tax on anyone making, say, over$10 million of 50%. Can I just amend that slightly to something that's gotten very popular recently, which is the wealth tax? Just because this seems to be the direction in a lot of ways that the Democratic Party's heading. California, they proposed the wealth tax. We've just seen a federal proposal.

40:07I mean, alternative minimum tax is also interesting, But given wealth tax is so popular, what do you make of that? You may not know that I introduced the graduating. We have a flat tax in the state of Illinois. I introduced a graduated income tax. It would lower taxes on 97 percent of people in Illinois and raise taxes on the top three percent in Illinois. We could not get that done back in 2019. I really believe that we've got to have a fairer tax system where the wealthy pay a much higher rate than people who are just working class. In fact, most people shouldn't have to pay a lot of tax. and indeed there shouldn't be the same tax rate that is applied to someone like you, Scott, as compared to a nurse or someone who's working at McDonald's.

40:53So, I'm sorry, did you have something? Yeah, I mean, the wealth tax in particular, because this seems to be one of the issues that is going to divide people. Some would say that the wealth tax is going too far. Or maybe it would disincentivize investment. Maybe it's too anti-business. Like, where do you land on this ultimately? Like I said, I think the wealthy—and we've talked about a millionaire's tax here in the state of Illinois as an alternative to a graduated income tax. By the way, do you know who introduced the graduated income tax in the United States? Abraham Lincoln. But how does that work if it's not federally mandated?

41:28Because you just—everyone moves to Florida. It doesn't have to be a federal. How do you do that? I mean, aren't you just going to lose more and more? I mean, it's easy to have class warfare and demonize billionaires, but if you lose them, you lose a lot of tax revenue, no? I get it, but we also have a much better education system than Florida does. We have a much better health care system than Florida does. Those billionaires can get great education in Florida, Governor. I get that the billionaires can. It's true. They can go anywhere. They can go to Monaco if they want to. But I'm suggesting to you that I want to live in a state where we protect people's rights, where we're making sure that people have health care.

42:03We're making sure that people get a decent income. And that includes the right to organize and collectively bargain. Because if you want to deal with affordability, by the way, put more money in people's pockets. That's the best way to do it. But I also think that, you know, we're a state. Look, I think there's a lot of pride in the people of Chicago and the people of the state of Illinois about our state. yes, it's colder here than it is in Florida. There is not much I can do about that. Although slowly, I was getting slowly, but surely. Oh, by the way, Florida is going to need fresh water just like everywhere else.

42:39So actually, you've seen, if you look at the projections going forward, people moving across the country, the projections are that people move more and more toward the Midwest and not away from it because of the water problem. So you've been very generous with your time. we're going to wrap up with the personal lightning round. Okay. Guilty pleasure. Oh, well, you can see I've had a lot of guilty pleasures. Most of them have been food-oriented, but I guess cheesecake. Eli's cheesecake, I might add. Living person that has the most impact on you. My wife, who's been amazing. A person who's no longer with us that's had the most impact on you.

43:22I mean, I know you're asking all the, you know, the you're getting answers from me that you probably are uninterested in. But my mother, who was an activist for LGBTQ rights and for abortion rights in the 60s and 70s when it was hard. Last piece of media you've read or watched that's really moved you or impacted you. Oh, boy. You know, now I'm consuming so much every day that I'm not sure that's really moved me. there's a story that I just read recently about a transgender woman who went missing. And in the course of that story, it not only covered her family's journey trying to locate her or determine if she had been abducted and killed, which often has happened, unfortunately, but also it talked about the challenges that transgender people have with you know the the mental health challenges that are brought on by societies the mores that people put and you know the way people treat transgender people so I don't know that that moved me because I really believe that we ought to be protecting every single person individual rights and respecting everybody and I think that unfortunately is not the tone or tenor of the leadership of this country right now and the result of that is that we're moving backward, not forward and protecting people.

44:48Best advice you've ever received. My mother, uh, once again, when she sent me off for my very first job, official legal job, uh, where I had a paycheck and paid to the paid into the union also. Um, uh, but I, I went off to work. I was 14 years old and, um, and I, my first job, my family, my father started a hotel business and my family was in the hotel business and I, I got really, they may not know, you know, uh, and, and, uh, it was, it was actually the job by the way was, was, uh, uh, picking up the laundry at a, at a, a motel. Uh, and this is like the dirty sheets, right? Picking up the dirty sheets and then loading them into the washing machine and then picking them out of the washing machine, throwing them into the dryer.

45:40So, you know, not a terrific job, but a great first job. My mother said to me as I was leaving the very first day, she said, now, remember, you have to work twice as hard as the guy next to you because you did not earn this job. He did. And I will never forget that. I mean, as long as I live and I have tried always to work as hard, harder, twice as hard as the people that I'm working next to, because I'm frankly, I landed in the lucky tub.

46:17Advice you would give to young men who are struggling? One thing is that your relationships really matter. That, you know, having personal human connection to people really matters. And I know that in this world, more and more, that's falling apart. People do not have personal connection. So one is to maintain your connection. I think it's harder and harder, especially in a world where and this is just a fact of life and a positive one where women are more financially independent than they have been ever before. and that should continue. But that doesn't mean that, you know, men can't be protectors and providers and partners, you know, with women who are financially independent.

47:03And I think it's just that we are living with some old mores that have been foisted upon a new world still, right? And especially when you've got somebody who wants to, you know, who says he wants to make America great again, as if it's like we got to go back to the 1950s for America to be great. And so that's my, you know, my advice is that. And I guess, you know, recognizing that you can't, you know, you really need your world aperture and view to be wider and not narrower. Stop, you know, spending all of your time on social media and spend a lot of your time putting it aside and actually interacting with people.

47:44And we'll wrap up.

47:51We'll wrap up here. Where you felt your lowest moment where you were most sort of, I don't know, grieving or unhappy in your life. And when you look back on your life, what you think you'll point to as being the point in your life where you're the happiest and most fulfilled. Well, I'll give the latter one. I mean, maybe it's too classic, but I mean, literally the birth of my first child was probably the happiest moment I can imagine. I mean, it's hard not to say that my wedding was important, but I'm not sure my wife will listen to the podcast. But it is true, the birth of my first child. And then I think, I mean, there's no doubt.

48:31I lost my father when I was seven and my mother when I was 17. And between those two, in that time period, my mother was an alcoholic and there is I'm not sure when I was seven if I fully understood the loss that I was experiencing I mean I understood it in the 10 years after but it included also the loss of my mother because essentially my brother and sister and I were taking care of my mother for some of that time she was an amazing person when she was sober she was the smartest person you'd ever meet. And as I said, she was an activist in years when that was really hard to do. So I just, I'd mentioned this, the lowest moment is one of those two moments when I, my father passed away when I was seven, my mother passed away when I was 17, that moment when my mother passed away, probably because I was more cognizant of maybe that I was more alone in the world or that I didn't have family mentors, let's say, anymore, except my brother and sister who, you know, were close as a result.

49:42I don't want to end there. If you had a magic wand, if you had a magic wand and you would want one policy or one thing to change about America, what would that thing be? It has to be that no one in this country should go without having the opportunity to have a great job and a good paying job. I mean, that to me, the dignity of work is so vitally important. That's not to suggest that people who are very vulnerable and don't have a job, you know, and can't get a job because of their vulnerabilities, developmental disabilities, or other things shouldn't, you know, be people that we are caring for and making sure we're lifting up.

50:15But I'm telling you, like, the idea that we're going to go into a world now where possibly we're not going to have enough jobs because of AI, I think we have to start thinking seriously right now, because there is no time to waste about what does the world look like in the future? Because people need jobs. It can't be that we're just handing out profits to people as a result of what AI is happening. Maybe that's one way to deal with it. Or I think a lot of the oligarchs that Donald Trump spends his time with think that we shouldn't actually give any money to anyone and that they should be the only ones who make it.

50:49But even if you say, let's distribute the trillions that they're going to make from this, That's not the answer. It is the dignity of work that I think really matters to people. And yes, people need to never go without enough to be able to provide the basic necessities and a little bit more because no one can afford anymore. A working person can't afford to go to Disney World. A working person can't afford to take their family on vacation anymore. That is not a world that like working to survive, that's not enough. and so we've got to have a world where we recognize the holistic benefit that it is to be human and what it is that we need to do to lift people up lift people up please join me in thanking the governor of the great state of Illinois J.B.

51:38Pritzker this episode was produced by Proc Media like and subscribe thank you so much have a good night

51:56You help me In kind reunion As the world turns And the dark flies In love

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