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UIC labor professor Robert Bruno said a second CTU walkout on Lightfoot’s watch “would have not only prevented or delayed CPS from providing instruction to over 300,000 students but in the long run been disastrous. Being able to deliver instruction and educational services in the third largest school district in the country during a pandemic is an enormous logistical puzzle; trying to do so without the full support of her school staff is highly improbable.”
Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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It’s efficient because you don’t need to maintain buildings or pay for utilities. It’s efficient because you don’t need as many teachers or administrators. It’s efficient because children don’t need to travel. It’s efficient because you don’t need to maintain fleets of buses or hire drivers. It’s efficient because you don’t need school security or worry about protecting students. It’s efficient because parents can be more involved (if they choose). It’s efficient because you don’t need to worry about weather.
Because it is the unions that run Chicago and Illinois