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.
“We see no point in troops wandering around relatively low-crime areas, scaring tourists and residents alike,” this says. Wrong. Fully armed soldiers standing on streets in key areas has been routine in European cities for a couple decades, and it’s good. A few along Michigan Ave. for example, would do wonders there.