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If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
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.
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Pritzker’s extreme progressive agenda includes billions in free stuff that he just isn’t willing to eliminate. The incremental cost of caring for illegals is spread across many budget categories. That should be the first step taken in addressing structural budget deficits. Instead we have Ralph espousing every angle to squeeze more out of the taxpayers. Typical.
Taxing services would be the start to more businesses leaving the state. There, that’s a better title of an article.
Sorry Wreck It Ralph but once again you are basically full of shit. While I am no fan of Rauner, the backlog of unpaid bills pre-dated his term in office. The decades of Madigan running the state was the reason but you don’t have the stones to say it. Rauner’s governing was DOA because of Madigan. If Pritzker’s fiscal stewardship was so great then why is the state facing a fiscal cliff and a deficit this year? Part of the reason is the year over year of increases to the funding of the public schools that is not sustainable. How… Read more »
Relatedly, a tired excuse from the Dems on the pension crisis is that pensions can’t be impaired, according to the IL constitution. The IL constitution could be changed if the Dems wanted to do so. Instead, IL’s outrageous pension debt worsens every year.
Something has to be impaired! One problem is that salaries and seniority are also part of union contracts that are also unimpairable. Free water from the spout is a human right. Tax those who can pay for tribute and free stuff. Somehow theft is ok when committed by Robin Hood or politicians.
You are not impairing anything. My union brothers and sisters are owed and we will be paid. Cut spending elsewhere or raise taxes because our labor isn’t free. You are free to move so stop acting like it’s theft to pay your share of taxes.
Your brothers and sisters, huh? The younger sibs drinking from the trough now will be pretty upset when their wages are frozen (cut spending) and their taxes increase to support the older siblings who gorged themselves on the trough.
Get ready for serious sibling rivalry.
Great idea. Tax services. Tax retirement income. Tax anything else you can find to tax, but by no means should you reduce any government spending. Keep that foot firmly pressed on the accelerator as your vehicle flies off that cliff. Those of us no longer in the vehicle can hardly wait to see the fiery crash.
We all enjoy a taste of schadenfreude now and again. Most of us don’t make it our main course, day after day after day.
I would assume that a tax on services would apply to attorney fees including the high fees on some of the massive personal injury cases in St Clair and Madison Counties. I think we can be assured that the trial lawyers, generally Democrats, would fight these type of taxes tooth and nail. Illinois seems to be unwilling to quit spending so higher taxes are needed but as long as Democrats are in control I think we can more or less plan a tax on services is not in the cards.