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Ed Bachrach of the Center for Pension Integrity and Wirepoints’ Ted Dabrowski wrote a new Tribune OpEd covering the latest attempt by state lawmakers to sweeten the pension benefits of Tier 2 public employees. They warn that hiking pensions benefits – and hiding the costs using funding ramps – will lead to intergenerational inequity.
Read more about the Tier 2 issue:
Summary and audio linked here.
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.
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Audio and summary
I have a Tier One pension that is a quarter of social security.
Based on how many years of work?
My mom’s husband who retired as a teacher at age 58 is getting about 4.5 time the average SS payment for someone his age. So there is another data point.
Based on my very small sample size, I think your multiplier may be a bit high but isn’t far off for the average Tier 1 teacher retiree. For working nine months a year as a teacher for 30-some years, that equates to a crazy-high pension. Also, I’m sure you know you can’t even collect a SS check until you’re 62, and even then, the benefits are reduced.
My friend’s parent was a teacher in the northwest suburbs. Just looked zir up. 40 years of ‘service’ in the online database. Zir has a $140k a year pension for past 14 years. That’s $1,960,000 so far. If zir’s lives another 14 years, and that’s likely, with the COLA, that’s another $2,000,000. Where else on earth (other maybe than in corrupt Ukraine) can a PUBLIC SERVICE WORKER retire with $4,000,000 in benefits at age 62? That’s insane, absolutely completely bat$hit insane. I work in the private sector in a moderately well paying profession and and upon retirement, from people I… Read more »
“Sane” is a relative term depending upon one’s long-standing point of view. Maybe you and those who live agreeably in your world are the “ insane” people. You might ponder that.
Hypothesis rejected for lack of evidence.
James is an idiot, just ignore him. His postings are nothing but a festering scab in the comment sections.
I disagree.
You are trying to appeal to your numerous buddies here, and I’m sure they agree. Yet, a thoughtful and useful life is never that simple—feeling good and even superior by denigrating another person’s point of view to thunderous applause, let’s say. Here’s a famous person of a bygone era who made a point to say so: the quote “Where all think alike, no one thinks very much” is often attributed to Walter Lippmann. At least I have Walter as my friend here, and that’s comfort enough. Stick around to see what other uncomfortable things might be said about your value… Read more »
Don’t forget Zir may also have been saving and another million or so.
And the Good News is Trump policies have destroyed the Stock Market, and the Illinois Pensions Fund is a big loser. Now the private sector taxpayer who lost lots of money in their 401K can pay higher taxes to make up for the public sector pension fund loses.
Trump better wake up to his problems. Most of America may still like the general direction he wants to take the country, but the list of bad ways he’s trying to do it is growing. A big one for me is the arrest and deportation of nonviolent protesters here legally on visas.
You are 100 percent correct Mark. Trump has done a lot of things that please the majority of the voters (secure the boarder, deport criminals, getting men out of women’s sports) but patience will start to wear thin if the price of cars sky rockets and the stock market continues to suffer. He could even be right on tariffs but I highly doubt the electorate will have the patience to actually see the benefits.
I avoid predictions, but I’ll make one that Trump’s approval ratings will be down significantly by the end of next week.
That may be Mark but Trump and his strongest supporters will NEVER believe it. The polls consistently under report his popularity so I imagine it will brushed off as “fake news”. I can’t say I blame them considering how the media has treated everything he has said or done.
But understand that I do support summary deportation of anybody supporting our pension system. (Kidding, kidding, kidding.)
LOL. Thumbs up from me.
What media are you watching? It’s all negative to Trump all the time? Legacy news is lying to you. Conservative media blasts Trump regularly for his bad decisions but praises his good ones. I consume dozens of hours of conservative media a week. Legacy media lies to you about everything. You cannot formulate any opinion about what is really going on in the conservative world by watching fake news.
Conservative media, alone, does not give you the whole story.
But Paul Harvey did!
They will not be down significantly because he deported foreign agents and student agitators who abused Biden’s lax student visa policy. Most Americans didn’t even go to college so they could care less what happens to some agitator with a full ride paid for tuition to some leftist university. Most seem to be quite happy about it. In fact, Trump just undid nearly all of Biden’s and Obama’s student loan repayment plans and income based repayment plans. Students have to pay back their loans now or the government will garnish their paychecks. Not a peep from Republicans anywhere, they don’t… Read more »
I did not blame the student deportations for thinking his ratings will drop, though it’s a big deal to me. It’s a growing list of other thing that will start hurting Trump. As for certain of the deportations SHOULD be important, see my other comment.
I consume quite a bit of conservative media and right now the biggest complaint from virtually everyone is that’s he’s deporting TOO FEW people. The deportations aren’t going quickly enough. Why is he only focusing on criminals not just rounding up entire neighborhoods? He’ll never get to 20,000,000 at this rate, maybe 1,500,000 in the next few years if he’s lucky. The sob stories have zero effect on non-Democrats. Everyone’s got their own opinions but the rounding up of agitator foreign college students is a non-issue for most people. I’m telling you, a large chunk of Trump voters are all… Read more »
Mark – I see where Musk believes millions of undocumented are receiving SSN benefits. Not really a fan of Musk, and I don’t think he is discovering these matters on his own (plenty of GS-10’s with scant opportunity for a promotion will indeed complain) but Musk is likely in the ball park correct. The migrants come here because if they can receive benefits that enable them to live better than 90 percent of the world. Take these away and people will self deport. No need to chase the non criminal. Trump never known for patience should let economic enforcement take… Read more »
You are right on all points, IMHO.
Musk isn’t doing the day to day 24 hours shifts with DOGE anymore They’ve ramped up from the 6 to IIRC 100 or 200 people now, they’ve got a co-founder of AirB&B working with them now too. Musk has handed off most of the day to day DOGE operations onto his consigliere, a guy who has worked with him at several of his other companies. Musk doesn’t really run any of his companies, he gets good people and pays them well, and then he comes in as needed to solve problems. There’s stories about engineering teams calling him to solve… Read more »
yup, he has realistically an extremely short, 2 yr, time frame to make monumental “Mar-A-Logo Accord” changes.
The problem even larger that I think he’ll face is senior citizens and even others who need help with accessing SS benefits with reasonable convenience and promptness. That’s a HUGE group of voters who won’t appreciate the expected deterioration there and elsewhere due to the swift and somewhat crass, thoughtless ways various programs and their staffing are being some combination of disrupted, reduced and abandoned. Those people will tend to turn against him in significant percentages.
I know the media is playing that up James but I’m not sure that’s a real issue that will have an immediate impact on voter sentiment. Older Trump supporters will just use it as another example of “useless government employees” and Trump is right to fire these “useless” people. Obviously we don’t know if this will be a real issue but you’re right if it’s big enough it could change some minds. However, my experience is that older people are pretty entrenched in their political “team” no matter what happens.
Maybe, but for those directly affected as i described there will be decided distaste for disruption they personally have to encounter. They won’t be he hesitant to express their opinions, believe me.
Good news here in Belvidere/Rockford is the the local SS office may stay open according to local news outlets. When I went to the Rockford SS office most of the people waiting were 1/3rd my age with many little kids in tow. Most likely there for SSI benefits.
You are 100% wrong and have no idea what Trump’s voters believe, unless of course, you get your fake news from NBC or something.
I have 2nd or even 3rd thoughts about Trump. I spoke to people and they said Trump seems to be the Putin of the West. He’s talking about getting Greenland-Canada (not Ron Canada the Arby’s voice)-Panama Canal-Gaza which sounds more like what Putin wants to do in his part of the world. This has become scary. At first closing the border is good aa is deporting criminals. The S.S. office will close in Rockford which is very busy/the market is down 750 as of a few minutes ago-inflation due to tariffs has still not been figured out-coffee prices may double… Read more »
Believe me, I have my many complaints about Trump’s first term, but he’s playing 4D chess here in his second term. Many of his policies are for the long term and will affect the country favorably 50 years from now after he and we are long gone. He’s basically said he wants fortress North America to protect against rising powers. How quickly we forget the follies of the two world wars last century between European powers vying for supremacy. Trump – probably correctly – sees the 21 century wars being between China and the west. China has a billion people… Read more »
A list of activist judges is growing too. This is a big one for you Mark?
For sure. Fixes for the nationwide orders they have been issuing are available, and hopefully adopted soon. There are options by legislation and court rules.
Seems to me a numbers game Mark. More so than an oops we grabbed the wrong person. Think of the numbers of radical students/educators etc let into this country. Non citizens have very limited due process if any because they are subjects of another country. Non violent (with cooperation) swift deportation is due process.
Fixes, options and items getting resolved in regards to immigration have never been turn-key as you and I hope for.
https://archive.is/VU5L4
Mark, please I’m begging you, don’t believe the lies fake news we read in the legacy news. These aren’t nonviolent protesters. They are active participants in terrorism organizations and several of them are actual foreign agents, aka spies and agitators. Mahmoud Khalil the supposed nonviolent protestor had a security clearance from the British government. A security clearance from a foreign government for his work with UNRWA, which for all practical purposes, is a front organization for Hamas. These people are agitators – some of whom are sponsored by foreign governments – who have abused Biden’s lax visa rules to attend… Read more »
Whoa there. Don’t equate, with zero evidence, Khalil and Venezuelan gang members (who I agree should be deported) with the category where I said Trump is wrong — nonviolent ones getting hauled off without any fair process whatsoever, only because they said something the administration doesn’t like. Khalil, evidence indicates, is an active member of a terrorist organization (CUAD, which is basically a Hamas unit. He probably also committed trespass and vandalism, and lied on his visa application. Show me any bit of evidence suggesting the Tufts University woman, Ozturk, is like that. There is none, except a baseless claim… Read more »
We’re not blindly hauling them off. We are sending them home. The constitution doesn’t give foreign agitators due process rights to contest the revocation of student visas. In fact, the constitution doesn’t give due process rights to visas at all. Of the criticisms of the American immigration system is that the immigrant is subject to an almost arbitrary interview overseas which can be denied for almost any reason – with no ability to contest and no due process – by an employee of the consulate or embassy. I don’t need to micromanage every visa that Rubio has decided to revoke.… Read more »
I really wonder about the story she was detained solely because of an op-ed published only a few days before in Tufts University school paper. Not even one of the more well-known schools. Surely they could have found a bigger target if the goal was just grabbing somebody over their speech. Stroll around Northwestern, there would be plenty of potential targets.
It’s possible there’s more to this story.
“Blindly hauling people off with no explanation and no evidence, even noncitizens, is not what America is about”. . You might want alter that word “is” to “was” in that America is now Trump World, the place where basically he is largely legally unanswerable to most past Presidential restraints. I know I’m thrilled, and apparently you are, too.
I am reasonably confident the courts will end up restricting Trump in a sensible manner consistent with the Constitution. However, he also needs to be pressured by all of us who like the general direction he is trying to take the country, but who recognize the wrong in some of his means.
People are so narrowed minded and ignorant of history they forget that Trump IS the moderate choice here. For example, in past times, FDR sent Japanese citizens to internment camps in the desert for years. Jackson ignored the Supreme Court and marched Indians off their land and off to Oklahoma. Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and ordered Sherman TO BURN THE STATE OF GEORGIA TO THE GROUND. One president, I can’t remember, who approved the Mason-Dixon line, saying that these states can have slavery, these other states can’t. Wilson effectively shut down the press with the Espionage and Sedition Acts of… Read more »
Those examples of Jackson, FDR, Sherman etc. are not precedents to be followed, they are to be rejected. I believe in the America JD Vance promoted in his wonderful Munich speech, honoring free expression. Imagine if a Dem president takes the same view as you and is allowed to based on precedent to be established now. For nonviolent, legal noncitizens, this is a matter of simple, common sense fairness. Honor what the Superman shows once said at their start: Truth, justice and the American way. And as a political matter, if you like the general direction Trump is trying to… Read more »
But what Trump is doing is entirely legal and within the purview of the State Department to revoke student visas. You may not like it, you may not agree with it, but it’s hardly authoritarian, it just goes against your sense of fairness. And that’s OK, but just remember, those we are removing do not have the same values as you, and while you may grant them freedom of speech, they do not and have not allowed you the same freedom. And at it’s core, that’s my problem with this argument: the party who just wants to give the other… Read more »
I expect that law that allows deportations of legal residents based just on the word of the Secretary of State will be struck down on due process grounds. It should be, even if the courts only recognize more limited constitutional rights for noncitizens. No question the left is the worst enemy of free speech. But there’s no way the left’s censorship and authoritarianism should be replaced the right’s own version. That would be hypocritical. It wouldn’t work in the long run. And it’s just plain wrong if you believe in the marketplace of ideas, which is the foundation of democracy… Read more »
I guess we can agree to disagree. I’ll give Rubio and Trump the benefit of the doubt. Like I said, I’m not going to micromanage every student visa they revoke. And being totally honest, it’s questionable these people would have ever been allowed to study here on a student visa in the first place, but for Biden’s admin just opening the doors in a treasonous manner to let everyone in. The Biden admin increased the F-1 student visa rate by several hundred thousand over Trump, and even over Obama’s first term (his second term he went crazy, let everybody in).… Read more »
Please read this closely, knowing it’s sure as heck not from mainstream media: https://reason.com/volokh/2025/03/30/universities-should-challenge-trumps-speech-based-deportations-of-students-in-court/
How fast could a “class” proponent reach the U.S. Supreme Court on both birthright citizenship and nationwide injunctions or TRO’s? It would be beneficial to courts, nationwide, to have these issues resolved under the Federal Constitution but do you think the current Court is disposed to accept such a case until the Court of Appeal have had an opportunity to weigh in? In other words, would this approach provide a speedy resolution?
Amended reply: Excerpt from congress.gov/crs_external_products/R/HTML/R48467.web.html “Supreme Court decisions lay out general tests for when courts should grant injunctive relief and impose some guidance on the proper scope of such relief. Currently, however, no statute or Supreme Court majority decision lays out a specific test for when a nationwide injunction should issue. In the absence of binding legal authority, courts facing decisions about the scope of injunctive relief have drawn upon the foregoing policy arguments and the general legal standards that govern requests for injunctive relief, weighing the applicable factors on a case-by-case basis. Applying those principles, federal courts at all levels have… Read more »
I think it’s possible that the Supreme Court could fix this in appeals of some of the pending cases. Even lefty Justice Kagan, I believe, has indicated a fix is needed. And here’s about pending legislation to do it:https://www.wsj.com/opinion/a-bill-to-stop-nationwide-injunctions-legislation-policymaking-judicial-branch-courts-cf4cbe22?st=zP7CsJ&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
A group of libertarian professors are against revoking visas and deporting students. That’s not surprising. They encourage universities to spend legal fees on behalf of these students and suggest courts to issue ‘nationwide injunctions’ to prevent further deportations rather than decide each case on the merits. If I didn’t know any better, this article is almost indistinguishable from the #Resistance pieces found all over the internet. And then these professors have the nerve to suggest that deportations could chill free speech and prevent students from completing academic work. Meanwhile, these same ‘free speech’ professors work for and earn their income… Read more »
Here’s another good one at National Review, IMO, except that the author is wrong on the law — I expect the government will lose this case.https://archive.ph/7eRwl
The author laments that his “long-dormant inner libertarian awakens” when a student visa is revoked seemingly for reasons he disagrees with. And that’s the problem with libertarianism: it doesn’t have any values other than letting others do whatever they want, and that includes allowing the left to walk all over them. They’ve liberated nothing while allowing the left’s seemingly unstoppable onward march for decades. In my youth I flirted with libertarianism but soon came to realize that The person who just wants to be left alone will always lose to the person who wants to control others. Conservativism has failed… Read more »
I’m fascinated by team Trumps “Mar-A-Lago Accord” which big picture economically I understand the rational but I don’t see how Trumps tariff war, especially when he changes it daily, will work?
Chicago own, Jim Bianco does a good job explaining. And also with $36 trillion in national debt & skyrocketing forget about 20% S&P 500 returns he’s predicting 6% going forward at best. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW4emuza_7Q)…..all as the markets nose dive today
Impossible for any Illinois voter/ taxpayer to keep up with, but if you read new BGA-Policy’s Pension HUB (https://www.bettergov.org/pensions-hub/) you discover Ill house/ Welsh created “Illinois House Pension Working Group” created this month which doesn’t even have any republicans on it, it’s spearheaded by machine ghoul rep Kifowit, who’s 100% behind using excuse of meeting “safe harbor” to essentially gut TIER II and return everyone to TIER I…. in depressing interview round table on BGA (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcqaHlsCzpQ) Kifowit, Martwick falsely promote that “safe harbor” has already been violated. None of these goons care what it costs they’re simply 100% public sector… Read more »
I guess a lot of the push to overturn TIER 2 and essentially move back to TIER 1 by public sec unions is pushed through “We Are One Illinois” (https://www.fixtier2.com/) and their “Fair Retirement and Recruitment Act” (SB 2/HB 2711), legislation sponsored by State Rep. Michael Kelly (D-Chicago) and who else- State Sen. Robert Martwick (D-Chicago) (https://www.fixtier2.com/legislation). Here’s HB2711 & SB0002 (they seem the same): Synopsis As Introduced Amends the Illinois Pension Code. Makes changes to Tier 2 benefits, including changing the amount of the automatic annual increase to 3% of the originally granted retirement annuity or 3% of the… Read more »
Obviously, from reading “We Are One Illinois” (https://www.fixtier2.com/) site, meeting “safe harbor” is just an excuse to go after gutting TIER 2 for putting everyone back in TIER 1.
Its called Safe Harbor Law. Tier 2 pensions as they stand dont pass safe harbor in that the payouts are lower than Social Security payouts and need to be brought up to snuff. Mark G. and I discussed this 10 years ago. So its no shock that it is happening. now nor is it any type of windfall. Simply put tier 2 pensions cannot payout less than social security and still be lawful. So the fix was required its not optional.
If you’re right, we’ve seen no proof of it yet. Not from lawmakers and not from the IRS. Here’s the full story as we see it.
https://wirepoints.org/illinois-lawmakers-shouldnt-burden-taxpayers-with-tier-2-pension-fixes-until-they-know-what-theyre-doing-wirepoints
Thanks for the link Ted. That was a good read.
Pensions are already unsustainable. Sooner or later, someone is not going to get paid.
They are hell bent on bankrupting this state. It is time for Tier 3.
No, as Jackie Gleason would say, “How sweet it is.”
You’re a regular riot. Bang, zoom to the moon, Alice!
No. The Pension grift in Illinois is sweet enough – thanks.