In July 2006, the Chicago City Council passed a “Big Box Living Wage Ordinance,” mandating that all retail stores larger than 90,000 square feet and operated by companies making more than $1 billion year in revenue pay workers a minimum hourly wage of $10 per hour. The ordinance was vetoed by Mayor Richard Daley in September 2006, who said the measure would be harmful to the city.

The growth of big box retail is a mixed blessing to local communities. There is strong evidence that jobs created by Wal-Mart in metropolitan areas pay less and are less likely to offer benefits than those they replace. Controlling for differences in geographic location, Wal-Mart workers earn an estimated 2.4 percent less than retail workers as a whole, and 14.5 percent less than workers in large retail in general. Several recent studies have found that the entry of Wal-Mart into a county reduces both average and aggregate earnings of retail workers and reduces the share of retail workers with health coverage on the job. The impact is not only one of substitution of higher wage for lower wage retail jobs, but also a reduction in wages among competitors. As a result of lower compensation, Wal-Mart workers make greater use of public health and welfare programs compared to retail workers as whole, transferring costs to taxpayers.