Every county in the U.S. has residents who can’t always afford enough food, says Feeding America’s Map the Meal Gap 2016 report. Nearly 1.7 million people in Illinois fit that description, the report says.

The state’s financial crisis is undermining community college efforts to equip Illinoisans, particularly from low-income families, with high-tech manufacturing skills at a time when manufacturing jobs are again on the rise after a decade-long decline.

In Illinois, the top beneficiary is Leslie Heffez, an oral surgeon who retired from the U. of Illinois at Chicago (where Donald Trump had to cancel one of his rallies), receiving an annual pension of $547,000. If he lives to age 81, he’ll get $18 million from taxpayers. Today, 50% of the cost of tuition at Illinois public universities goes to pensions. This means half of the student loan debt goes only to support ex-university employees who no longer work and saved little for their retirement. While this is the highest pension, the average is $71,600, and each retiree will

llinois residents who buy Blue Cross and Blue Shield health care coverage through the state insurance exchange may be in for Obamacare sticker shock, if proposed rate hikes by the largest insurers in Texas and Oklahoma are any indication.

National and state banking was a leading political issue in the 1820s and 1830s, and Illinois gave it a try soon after achieving statehood in 1818. Three years later, the General Assembly created a state bank that, incredibly, had few regulations and no capital.

Illinois lawmakers have convened a task force to investigate a spike in the theft of recyclable metals.

Looking back, we should count our blessings that Edgar never made another run for high office. Because the man clearly has no idea how to solve the myriad problems the state is facing. Problems he had a huge hand in creating.