John,
Every dollar handed to Big Tech in data center tax breaks is a dollar taken away from making life more affordable for families. Instead of lowering electric bills, funding schools and hospitals, repairing roads and bridges, or expanding access to health care, states are diverting public money to subsidize some of the wealthiest corporations in the world.
These tax giveaways put enormous strain on local budgets. At the same time, data centers consume enormous amounts of land, water, and electricity, driving up utility bills for everyone else. Local economies see little lasting benefit beyond the short-term work of construction, while households are left paying more for power and getting less in return.
Send a direct message to your state’s governor to invest in people’s needs, not in Big Tech data center tax breaks.
States across the country have already given away billions to lure data centers — including more than $1 billion in Texas alone. In Illinois, a single Microsoft data center received over $38 million in tax exemptions. That’s money that could have gone to classrooms, hospitals, public transit, or affordable health care. These subsidies prioritize corporate balance sheets over community well-being.
We need clear guidelines to prevent these misguided investments. Public funds should be used to strengthen schools, lower energy costs, make infrastructure resilient, and ensure access to health care — not to bankroll Big Tech’s expansion or channel bigger profits to Big Tech’s coffers.
Tell your governor to reject any efforts to provide Big Tech corporations with tax breaks to build data centers in your state. Those public dollars should be used to make life more affordable for residents — not to subsidize some of the richest companies in the world. Please protect our communities and say no to data center tax giveaways.
Send a direct message to your governor demanding an end to tax breaks for Big Tech data centers.
Thank you for reminding your governor to put people over Big Tech profits.
Robert Reich
Inequality Media Civic Action
