By: Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner
Illinois continues to suck wind at creating economic growth, wage gains and job creation, according to new 2024 economic data released late last week by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.
It’s a sad pattern that’s been true since before the pandemic. Illinois actually has fewer private sector jobs now than it did in 2019, in large part because the state’s GDP growth has been the nation’s 4th-slowest since then.
2024’s bad news starts with the economy. The BEA data shows Illinois ranked 9th-worst in economic growth nationally for all of last year, with the state’s GDP up just 1.2% after adjusting for inflation.
Compare that with Indiana’s economy, up 3.4%, or nearly three times the rate of Illinois’ growth.
Kentucky grew nearly 3%. And Missouri and Michigan grew by two-and-a-half percent. Only Iowa’s shrinking economy performed worse, hurt by poor agriculture and manufacturing sectors.
The growth of Illinoisans’ wages has also been stagnant compared to the rest of the country.
Average hourly earnings of private sector workers only grew 1.3% in 2024 – the 3rd-worst increase of any state.
In contrast, Wisconsin’s wages jumped by over 6%, the 2nd-best growth behind only Idaho. Iowa’s average hourly earnings grew 3.5%. And Indiana and Missouri’s earnings grew 2.6% – double that of Illinois.
Also released on Friday were the latest state employment numbers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. At 4.8%, Illinois’ unemployment rate remained the nation’s 5th-worst in February 2025.
Though Michigan and Kentucky are dealing with deep employment issues of their own, Illinois’ jobs situation is still far worse compared to Indiana, Missouri and Wisconsin.
Illinois currently has 321,000 residents looking for work. If the state had Wisconsin’s low unemployment rate of 3.2%, 107,000 more Illinoisans would have jobs today.
If Illinoisans were hoping for an economic boost last year to help them pay down their bills and afford their property taxes – and still have some money left over to put aside – they clearly ended up disappointed.
That won’t change until Illinois’ high-taxing, high-spending policies are flipped upside down.
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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.
But Governor Round Boy says everything is great.
Why can’t Wirepoints set some positive goals or find something good to write about? Dozens of negative headlines, without a hint of optimism, makes this property more of a meat grinder for Democrats than a community asset. Wirepoints can do better.
We have a long list of positive goals we have written about, all of which don’t get a moment’s consideration by those in power. As far as “something good to write about,” we make a special effort to find those things. We know full well people don’t like bad news and that they want optimism. But I put it to you: What good news can you cite that we have overlooked?
Today is an important voting day, but Wirepoints readers would never know that.
That’s a fair point to an extent. We could have had our own column on get-out-to-vote. Please do keep in mind that we have just three of us writing and researching, working more hours per day than you would probably believe, 7 days/week.
And astounding the original articles and research you 3 produce, vrs ST is now down to a staff of 84 from 107 after layoffs with 1/2 their content copied from other sources (per today’s Crains article– https://www.chicagobusiness.com/marketing-media/sun-times-wbez-appoint-new-top-editors-merged-newsroom)–OMG!!!….hoping everyone out there can contribute to WP
Anyone smart enough to read Wirepoints is smart enough to be aware of voting day.
Publius, the “good news” is covered sufficiently and frequently by Gov. Pritzker, those in charge of Illinois and the traditional media. They have a monopoly on messaging. From them you can read about how “well” Illinois’ economy is doing and how great our schools are – record graduation rates and the like. Just read the Tribune and the SunTimes and watch NBC5 or WGN. By contrast, you come to Wirepoints to get the facts, the data, and the counterpoints. Nothing will change until Illinoisans acknowledge the facts and then vote accordingly. We are doing our small part to tell the… Read more »
How about utility? Less move out and more take action! Cut the BS.
Nobody on staff is broken or over worked to the point of no hope. Political leaders have giant slogans proclaiming “OUR VOTE IS OUR POWER” and “TAKE ACTION NOW” on critical websites. I do appreciate interesting content, but I’m not going to let you all get in my way or screw things up more.
Publius, we have never advocated moving out. Some commenters do and some don’t, and we say that’s for them to decide. Our residence here should speak to what we’ve decided. In fact, I will be moving soon into the belly of the beast — Chicago. Please also remember that, as a nonprofit, we cannot make express candidate or ballot endorsements.
Why are you moving to Chicago?
For my work here, I want more direct contact with people and officials there. Chicago is the center of the disaster, and I want to be right there for my work here. Just an apartment downtown.
Mark – You will definitely be in our Prayers.
You should have your head examined moving into Chicago. I guess your children have grown up and left the house.
Yeah, probably. It’s just an apartment near to where my wife’s mom is in nursing home, and we do have a place in Wisconsin where I’ll probably spend most of my time. But we need somebody reporting from ground zero as the city descends.
The “Good News” is the day you leave the State of Illinois. In fact, it will be the best news your family and you ever get.
Because it writes about Illinois!?
Who woulda thunk that zero job growth and the influx of hundreds of thousands of low-wage workers would depress hourly earnings! Now only if Illinois could find a way to capitalize on those low wages….but we won’t…
The view of Pritzker, the Leftist Democrats, and public unions is ‘Let them eat cake’. The trends will continue.
If you recall though, those who espouse ‘Let them eat cake’ eventually are beheaded by the mob. But this time the mob will be the peasant class real taxpayers of this state torching the Illinois ‘aristocracy’ of Public Sector Unions, government workers, welfare takers and Democrat Politicians. The guillotines will be busy.
If only…..
This chart alone ought to be cause enough for Illinoisans to throw the bums out of office. Think of the damage being done to working men and women, their children and their neighborhoods.
The average Illinois citizen with a special emphasis on Chicagoans are lost in the happy useless talk that the areas main stream media feeds them.
You can bet it would be completely politically embarrassing to compare Illinois PUBLIC sector average hourly earnings growth to “average hourly earnings of PRIVATE sector workers only grew 1.3% in 2024 – the 3rd-worst increase of any state.”