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.
There are real power struggles between the R’s and D’s. This isn’t just some petty battle the elites force the plebs to fight. The R’s are in an existential battle against the D’s and about 1/2 the plebs. You can’t just stick your head in the sand and ignore it.