Small Business Job Creation Tax Credit

elliot@sbacil.org (Elliot Richardson) — Mon, 29 Dec 2025 21:32:26 GMT

The Small Business Job Creation Tax Credit will support small businesses and their local communities. This legislation will make a $2,500 tax credit available to small businesses that hire a net new employee.

To qualify for this tax credit, a small business must:

Have 50 or fewer full-time employees.
Hire a net employee and maintain that higher rate of employment over a 12-month period.
Hire an employee that works at least 35 hours per week.

The Small Business Job Creation Tax Credit would prove more beneficial for Illinois taxpayers than many existing incentives. For example, a small business that pays a new employee $40,000 generates more than $1,800 in income taxes in the first year alone.

The median employee tenure across all U.S. private-sector businesses is 3.5 years. This means that for a $40,000 employee, the state stands to collect more than $6,000 in income tax over the typical tenure of a new hire. Even for a $30,000 employee, the state would recover its initial investment within two years. This projection excludes potential increases in other taxes resulting from changes in disposable income.

Salary	Taxes Collected in First Year	Taxes Collected in 3.5 Years	Years to Recover Investment
$30,000	$1,344	$4,704	1.86
$40,000	$1,839	$6,436	1.36
$50,000	$2,334	$8,169	1.07
$60,000	$2,829	$9,901	0.88

Fees and Fines in the Proposed Chicago Budget

elliot@sbacil.org (Elliot Richardson) — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 15:07:21 GMT

Are you a Chicago small business owner? Do you work for a small business? Do small businesses support your Chicago community? If the answer is yes, please let your alderman/alderwoman know you are opposed to saddling small businesses with dramatically higher fees and fines.

The proposed Chicago budget dramatically increases a host of fees and fines that will hurt small businesses. For instance, some business licenses will increase from $250.00 to $1,000.00 while others will double from $250.00 to $500.00. Business licenses have to be renewed every two years! Annual food inspection fees are significantly increased, and other business fees are higher in the proposed 2026 budget. Fines will also greatly increase, sometimes doubling, should small businesses make a mistake and come out of compliance.

Small businesses have faced new mandates and continue being impacted by burdensome red tape. Chicago politicians should not extract dramatically higher fees from entrepreneurs just for the chance to do business in Chicago while punishing small businesses by increasing fines. Reach out to your alderperson and urge them not to raise fees and fines on Chicago small businesses in the 2026 budget.

SBAC Wire

Small Business Job Creation Tax Credit

Fees and Fines in the Proposed Chicago Budget