Audio: Wirepoints’ Mark Glennon says Chicago pension buyout plan mostly shifts debt rather than eliminating it, property tax surge doubles inflation over three decades – Chicago’s Morning Answer
April 3, 2026
9 Comments
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.
Illinois lost another 54,000 tax filers and dependents, net, according to the IRS. Since 2000, fleeing taxpayers have taken $94 billion of annual adjusted gross income with them.
It’s only going to get worse as downtown empties out and more real estate is vacated.
Vacant real estate means the building owners can’t pay the city property tax or take care of their buildings
This is a doom loop.
This is never going to work out good for the taxpayer.
Pension costs are the main driver of higher and higher taxes.
Chicago’s budget has grown by about 40% since 2019, but the biggest reason isn’t better services, it’s pensions and debt. Chicago’s total budget has grown by $3.53 billion, reaching $12.39 billion in 2025. Almost half of that growth, or about 46%, went to pensions and debt service.
Chicago’s share of 40% is double that of other major cities.
NONSENSE!!! They have no problem finding money for illegals. When all else fails just go back to the same idiots who keep electing you and hit them up They’re not real bright.
The Public Sector pensions are like economic cancer; it will kill the patient sooner or later. Getting rid of a public sector employee is like trying to get rid of Herpes. The pension costs are growing like wildfire and there is no hope of solving it now.