-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
The share of available office space downtown rose during the final three months of 2024 to 26.3%, marking the 10th consecutive quarter that the vacancy rate hit an all-time high, according to data from real estate services firm CBRE. The sobering metric for building owners is up from 23.8% at the end of 2023 and 13.8% when the COVID-19 pandemic began.
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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Have not heard a plan to resurrect Chicago. Not hard, if there is a will. U.S. based Business owners, big business, will continue to stay away, move away, from Chicago and the state. Ive seen many mistakes made over my past 60 years of growing up, living and working in Chicago, but the past 5 years , its almost as if the Mayors , and Governor, wanted this to happen. Deliberate at worse, incompetence at best.
Same at the national level. Policy has seemed to be made by finding the most suicidal actions possible. Our enemies must be saying, “Well done. You’ve done more from within to harm America than we could have hoped to do from outside.”
For this democrat filth, that is exactly their policy. They hate America and want to destroy it. No ifs, ands or buts about it.
Luckily our enemies are doing EVEN MORE to harm themselves than America could ever do to harm itself. It’s completely crazy, this decade is the fourth turning. For example, China saw how Japan destroyed their economy during the 1980’s and then decided to do the exact same thing on a scale unlike anything ever seen in human history. Their economy is a mess and they are exporting deflation. The country took nearly all of its wealth from the Chinese economic miracle, and then borrowed 10x over – to build empty cities throughout the country where no one lives. The connected… Read more »
Beautifully put. Now, more than ever, we may be the world’s last, best hope.
“Look at this nice thing we wrecked, heheheheh” they chuckle as they move on to the next thing to destroy.
No sense proposing a congestion tax. Just saying.
With companies trying to get people back to working in offices the city will try to get the speed limit dropped from 30 to 25. So it will then take longer to get to work. One of the alderman said the reduced speed will save 300 lives over a decade but nothing said about the hundreds of millions in fines the city will get in 10 years. On a side note there will be close to 6,000 people killed in those ten years and at least 25,000 shot. But 300 people will be saved due to reduced speeds.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/final-vote-lower-chicago-speed-213300144.html
I would like to see the study that shows 30 less deaths per year by reducing limit from 30 to 25.
( about Chicago 400 vehicular deaths in both 2022 and 2023)
https://news.wttw.com/2025/01/06/black-latino-and-older-chicagoans-more-likely-die-traffic-crashes-data-shows
Dang, vehicles are racist and ageist.
It’s insane that no one will admit that in the brown neighborhoods, there are lots of illegals driving with no insurance or drivers licenses, they literally come here from the third world and just get behind the wheel and start driving, so OF COURSE they get in more accidents because they don’t have experience driving. And in the black neighborhoods, the younger drivers are completely reckless, driving like insane maniacs, disregarding nearly all the traffic laws, spend 10 miles on the Dan Ryan to witness half a dozen examples of super speeders weaving in and out of traffic. The younger… Read more »
It is going to get worse before it gets better.
Nobody can put the toothpaste back into the tube. We can all thank Lori Lightfoot for closing downtown for months on end and then acting shocked, when after two years, nobody wants to go downtown anymore because of crime and protests. Lori – the carpet bagger DEI hire – would have been wise to study Chicago history. The billionaires of the gilded age lived on Prairie Ave. But then the anarchists marched on Prairie Ave and industry encroached on that storied Avenue, and before long, there was nothing left but vacant lots and blight. It took 110 years before Prairie… Read more »
So let’s build a new CTA rail line extension at a modest $1B a mile to bring all those workers downtown!
No worries. Prickster and Brando will save you. They have all the answers. Just ask them.