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.
The author seems to conclude that because the lessons are clear, politicians will actually learn and act upon them. Wishful thinking, especially in Illinois. Politicians have their agendas, and no amount of reality will deter them.