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.
If we were lucky, Chicago would also adopt a 10% across the board cut. $9MIL budget. $838 MIL deficit.
A 10% across the board cut would erase $838 MIL deficit for the upcoming year. It would not solve all our problems but it would be a start.
Lightfoot, are you listening?