On Tuesday, Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D-IL) delivered remarks at the annual Chicagoland commerce meeting.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:03 Well, thank you.
00:09 Good morning, good afternoon to all of you.
00:12 Thank you to Kevin for those very kind words
00:15 and also for your bold leadership of the chamber.
00:19 As many of you know, he took the chairmanship
00:22 over at maybe the most difficult time
00:25 in the history of our business community
00:27 and led with compassion and strength.
00:30 We all owe Kevin a huge debt of gratitude.
00:34 So thank you, Kevin.
00:36 [APPLAUSE]
00:39 Congratulations and good luck to Dan Lynch
00:45 on being named the next board chair.
00:48 United, of course, is lucky to have you,
00:50 and so is the chamber.
00:53 And I want to just say a quick thank you
00:56 to Jack Lavin, who has been an amazing leader on your behalf,
01:00 continuing to provide excellent service to all the members
01:05 of the chamber and who has great relationships
01:07 across both sides of the aisle in Springfield
01:11 and works on your behalf every single day.
01:13 So thank you very much, Jack.
01:14 [APPLAUSE]
01:17 I also want to thank the mayor of the city of Chicago
01:22 for his partnership in our collective efforts
01:25 to restore the business climate that will help
01:28 our city and our state thrive.
01:31 And let me also acknowledge Kevin Warren,
01:33 who we're counting on to lead a similar turnaround
01:37 with our beloved Chicago Bears.
01:39 [APPLAUSE]
01:43 So look, it's great to be here with all of you.
01:49 You are the people who are helping to power Illinois's
01:52 economic renaissance.
01:54 And thanks in no small part to the tireless efforts
01:57 of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce,
02:00 we are collectively fostering an environment
02:03 where businesses large and small from every industry can thrive.
02:08 When I took office just a few short years ago--
02:11 although I have to admit it feels like about 25 years,
02:15 20 of them COVID--
02:17 but I pledged to make Illinois the best state in the nation
02:22 to do business.
02:23 And standing in front of you today,
02:24 I'm proud to say that we've made real progress
02:27 in that direction.
02:28 I want to tell you about some of that.
02:30 We've grown the Illinois economy to over $1 trillion.
02:34 That makes us the fifth largest economy
02:37 among the states in the nation.
02:39 And if we were an independent country,
02:41 we would be the 18th largest economy in the world
02:44 and a member of the G20.
02:46 So think about that.
02:47 On average, last year, a new business
02:51 moved to Illinois or expanded operations here
02:54 every single day.
02:56 In fact, more than that, more than 500 companies in total
03:00 moved here or expanded in 2023.
03:04 Yeah, that's--
03:04 [APPLAUSE]
03:09 It's brought billions of dollars in new business investments,
03:12 and it's created tens of thousands of jobs.
03:15 And that didn't just happen by accident.
03:17 For a couple of decades, our state
03:20 was plagued by fiscal challenges, we all know.
03:23 And it weighed on our businesses and our residents.
03:28 So when I took office, I set forth a plan
03:31 to change all of that.
03:33 Over the last five years, I've taken a whole-of-government
03:36 approach to not just rectifying the mistakes of our past,
03:40 but also building for the future.
03:42 And I don't just mean the next year or two,
03:44 but for the next decades.
03:46 We started by getting our fiscal house in order.
03:49 Just last week, my partners in the General Assembly and I
03:52 passed our sixth consecutive balanced budget.
03:56 That doesn't sound like a big deal in other states,
03:58 but it's a big deal in the state of Illinois.
04:00 [APPLAUSE]
04:01 And not only that, but since 2018,
04:05 we grew the rainy day fund to over $2.3 billion
04:09 from nearly zero.
04:11 We increased our state's pension fund ratio,
04:15 and we paid down our $8 billion revenue overdue bill backlog,
04:22 rather.
04:22 And we eliminated nearly all of our short-term debt.
04:26 Think about that.
04:27 We had debts that were near-term, medium-term,
04:31 and long-term.
04:32 And we've eliminated virtually everything
04:34 except our long-term debt.
04:36 Before I took office--
04:37 [APPLAUSE]
04:38 Appreciate that.
04:39 So just to give you an example of that, before I took office,
04:45 our state's days payable were--
04:48 and I'm not exaggerating-- 250 days.
04:51 And we were paying 12% interest on every bill overdue
04:56 by 90 days or more.
04:58 Today, our days payable is under 15,
05:02 which is very likely too fast.
05:03 But it is an effort to show the businesses
05:11 that the state does business with every day
05:14 that we can be responsible.
05:16 And we have had it at that level for years now.
05:19 So I feel like I need to tell the comptroller,
05:22 you can take it down to maybe 30 days payable.
05:26 We've built a record of fiscal responsibility
05:29 that has earned Illinois nine credit upgrades
05:31 since the start of my administration,
05:33 a reflection of the newfound confidence
05:35 that investors have in the strength
05:38 and the future of Illinois.
05:40 I digress just for a moment to tell you
05:42 that in the first couple of weeks of taking office in 2019,
05:46 I got on a plane, went to New York City,
05:48 and I met with not just the credit rating agencies,
05:52 but also the bond investors.
05:54 And I honestly had to say to them, look,
05:57 I know you haven't trusted the state of Illinois
06:00 in the past few years to get it right,
06:03 but I'm going to work at this every day.
06:05 And we have a plan.
06:06 And when I come back to you, we're
06:08 going to be able to prove to you that we
06:09 know how to govern ourselves.
06:11 That, by the way, was their big concern, that in Illinois,
06:15 we didn't know how to govern ourselves.
06:17 And so that's a hard thing to overcome.
06:19 That's a reputational problem that you
06:21 have to work on for years.
06:23 But I'm happy to say, as you can see from the credit upgrades,
06:26 we're getting recognized.
06:27 And by the way, the interest rate that we pay on our debt
06:33 is much lower than it has been in quite a long time.
06:39 So I'm very happy about that.
06:40 And we did all that while making long overdue investments
06:47 in our infrastructure, in our physical
06:49 and our human infrastructure.
06:52 We invested billions of dollars in our roads,
06:54 in our bridges, our rail, airports, and more.
06:57 And now we're ranked as the second best
07:00 state in the nation for infrastructure by CNBC.
07:05 We've invested in education from preschool to high school
07:08 and upgraded our workforce development in high schools
07:11 and community college, so much so
07:14 that we've earned new rankings as the number one
07:17 state in workforce development in the Midwest.
07:20 [APPLAUSE]
07:24 We've also been ranked in the top five for education
07:30 for pre-K to 12 education by both US News and World
07:34 Report and CNBC.
07:36 And that-- I should also mention we're in the top five states
07:40 for college readiness.
07:43 And because we have such great universities and colleges
07:46 in the state of Illinois, we're now
07:48 seeing enrollment increase after 20 years of decreases
07:54 of enrollment in our state universities.
07:57 We've pursued common sense pro-growth policies
08:00 that make it a no-brainer for businesses to relocate
08:04 and to expand here in Illinois.
08:06 We increased deductibility of net operating losses.
08:10 We cut the franchise tax.
08:11 We created new tax incentives for business expansions.
08:16 We cut the red tape on permitting.
08:18 We organized property tax abatement for new companies
08:22 and existing ones looking to expand.
08:25 And we rolled out the red carpet for businesses looking
08:28 to create jobs in our state.
08:30 The number of businesses and jobs in Illinois
08:33 is on the rise, and there's more to do, and we are doing it.
08:37 We've put a special focus on industries of the future,
08:41 pursuing a path to long-term sustainable growth.
08:44 We developed new incentives for quantum computing,
08:48 for electric vehicles manufacturing,
08:50 sustainable aviation fuel, chip manufacturers, data centers,
08:54 and life sciences, wet lab development.
08:57 And we launched the state's first ever closing fund
09:00 to get us over the finish line on major economic development
09:04 projects for our state.
09:06 Now, I want real, robust growth for existing and new businesses
09:12 that persists for generations.
09:14 I want entire communities and our overall economy
09:18 to be revitalized from the investments that we make today.
09:22 And I want sustainable growth and a great business
09:24 environment for your companies and for those from elsewhere
09:27 looking for a new home.
09:29 And we're seeing some big successes.
09:31 Chicago remains the top metro for corporate investment
09:36 as ranked by Site Selection Magazine.
09:38 And since-- yeah, also a good thing.
09:40 [APPLAUSE]
09:44 Since 2019, Illinois has risen 13 spots
09:48 in CNBC's Best States for Business.
09:52 We have more to go, but honestly, we're
09:54 in the top half of states.
09:56 We're, in fact, almost in the top third of states.
09:59 And I hope we'll get into the top 10 soon.
10:02 And just last year, we attracted two
10:04 of the largest manufacturing wins, Goshen and Stellantis,
10:08 in more than two decades for the state of Illinois,
10:11 which will add more than 4,000 manufacturing jobs.
10:15 The nation's largest community solar provider, Nexamp,
10:19 announced Chicago as its second headquarters.
10:22 Another leader in clean energy, Invenergy, a Chicago company,
10:26 announced last fall the expansion of their Chicago
10:29 flagship office and a new research facility.
10:33 In March, battery maker, NanoGraph,
10:36 announced the opening of a new Chicago facility
10:39 for advanced manufacturing and research.
10:42 And just a few weeks ago--
10:43 some of you may have read in the newspaper--
10:45 Google celebrated the progress of their renovations
10:49 at their upcoming Loop office location on LaSalle Street,
10:53 formerly the James R. Thompson Center,
10:55 soon to be the Google headquarters.
10:58 I want to finish today by--
11:00 yeah.
11:00 [APPLAUSE]
11:05 You should clap particularly hard
11:07 if you ever worked in the James R. Thompson Center,
11:10 because it needs this renovation.
11:13 I want to finish today by reassuring you
11:15 that while I'm focused on economic opportunity,
11:18 in all our mainstay industries, I'm
11:21 putting just as much effort into industries
11:23 that can supercharge growth for Chicago and for all of Illinois.
11:27 You may have heard me talk about quantum computing
11:29 from time to time.
11:31 And I won't bore you with a layman's explanation
11:35 of quantum superposition, or qubits, or quantum entanglement.
11:40 I'm not sure I could do it justice.
11:41 But suffice to say that the city that
11:44 attracts the best quantum scientists, the most
11:47 advanced quantum startups, and the largest quantum industry
11:52 investors will bring explosive growth to its economy.
11:56 And I want Illinois to be the national hub
11:58 for the new quantum economy.
12:00 Early on in my tenure, I insisted on the state
12:03 making a $200 million investment into quantum and AI development.
12:08 And I mention that as a point of pride,
12:11 because shortly after I did that,
12:13 I was at the National Governors Association
12:16 gathering in Washington.
12:18 And the folks representing California--
12:20 not the governor, but the folks that were with him--
12:23 all came up to me and said, how did you get that done?
12:26 We want to do that in California,
12:27 but you did it in Illinois.
12:29 We need it.
12:30 Give us the roadmap for getting that done.
12:32 I thought, if California is asking us
12:35 for the roadmap on how to get quantum computing invested
12:38 in by the state, we must be doing something right.
12:41 We were the first and largest state
12:43 to make such a commitment.
12:45 Businesses like Microsoft, IBM, Boeing, JP Morgan, and more
12:50 see the value in this and have become
12:52 part of our quantum ecosystem.
12:54 And we're now planning the creation of a quantum campus
12:59 here for startups, for established quantum players,
13:02 and for federal and private research institutions.
13:06 Between the quantum research that's going on at UChicago,
13:09 at UIUC, at Northwestern, at Fermilab, at Argonne,
13:13 and partner institutions throughout the Midwest,
13:16 we have unparalleled research infrastructure for this.
13:20 Collectively, we have a real shot
13:22 at becoming a national and global hub
13:25 for the quantum industry.
13:28 Between our advancements in quantum, in EVs, in agritech,
13:32 in clean energy, and life sciences,
13:36 and our work to incentivize growth
13:37 in our existing industries, my hope
13:40 is that decades down the line, our children
13:43 look back on decades of prosperity
13:46 and recognize the common sense decisions
13:49 that we all made to invest in ourselves and in our future.
13:53 And the way we make that possible
13:55 is, of course, by working together.
13:57 So I want to thank the chamber for helping us all work
14:00 together, and to all of you for being here today
14:03 and for being willing partners in the economic revitalization
14:06 of Illinois.
14:07 I can't wait to see where we go next.
14:10 Thank you all very much.
14:12 (applause)