The Value of Investing in Canadian Downtowns - International ...

Municipal Tax Base
The downtown makes a substantial contribution to the City of Toronto’s bottom line, comprising a quarter of the City’s
property tax revenue base. The downtown provides three quarters of the revenue collected from office spaces across
the City and a third of the revenue accrued from other commercial and retail properties. The downtown also provides
16% of revenue generated by multi residential properties and 12% from residential properties. These proportions
have been relatively stable over the past five years.
1,600,000,000
City of Toronto, Property Tax Revenues, 2011
1,400,000,000
1,200,000,000
1,000,000,000
800,000,000
600,000,000
400,000,000
200,000,000
-
Commercial Office Multi-Residential Residential Industrial
Property Tax Revenue (Excluding Downtown Wards)
Property Tax Revenue from Downtown Wards (20, 27, 28)
Jobs
Downtown Toronto is the largest employment cluster in the GTA, with 420,500 jobs (one-third of the jobs found
citywide). The employment profile of downtown Toronto is largely comprised of office jobs (65%); such as law firms,
computer services, management consultants and investment services. The number of jobs downtown has grown
three times faster than citywide, at 9% and 3% respectively between 2004 and 2009. 11
Downtown provides
25%
of the City’s total property
tax revenue (2011).
420,500
jobs
11
Ibid.
90