-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
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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Mark – You had an article recently that tracked all the operating losses the county reported over the years. Any idea how those loses tied back to their respective budgets? Because for all the hub-bub on being $200M short, how much you wanna bet the county will be deep in the red this fiscal year with or without the soda tax.
Right. Here is that article. Cook County is in blue. In all those years of actual losses they were claiming to have a balanced budget https://wirepoints.org/one-chart-shows-awful-fiscal-trajectory-of-chicago-area-and-illinois-wp-original/
So now they say they have to fill the 200m hole that’s been “blown” in the budget. Holes in a budget can be “blown” from either side of the equation. Spending, patronage, unsustainable promises, unneeded and duplicated services and assets and an unfriendly business climate have ‘blown” far more holes than the revenue side of the equation. But all they see is revenue, never a thought that mismanagement blows holes. Government cannot grow 10 percent a year doubling in size every decade.