Audio: Wirepoints’ Mark Glennon says Chicago pension buyout plan mostly shifts debt rather than eliminating it, property tax surge doubles inflation over three decades – Chicago’s Morning Answer
April 3, 2026
9 Comments
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.
Illinois lost another 54,000 tax filers and dependents, net, according to the IRS. Since 2000, fleeing taxpayers have taken $94 billion of annual adjusted gross income with them.
Another day, another NGO/SJW grifting organization based on skin color and skin color alone. It’s getting tiresome.
Help! What are the capital improvements we funded in each of the three years? (In the rented 800 square foot space.)
There are not many folks around who remember the wonderful bipartisan Jim Thompson Build Illinois program from 1985, And those who do know about the origins of that bond package– infrastructure, roads, schools, hospital and manufacturing plants– are vomiting when they see what garbage the funds are being used for today. The abuse of this program is a perfect example of how far Illinois has slipped into mediocracy and waste.
Democrats are simply incapable of stopping the grift. This is how they reward their most ardent voters and supporters.
Good to see these various local organizations scrutinized. There are billions in taxpayer money going to a huge list of them.
C’mon Mark. You know that in the words of Richie Daley, people in Chicago are “scrootened”, and not scrutinized.
BTW, the disappearance of Richie since 2011 is the most amazing “dog that didn’t bark” occurrence in Chicago history. There’s more information available on the disappearance of Amelia Earhart than there is on Daley Jr.
It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
It’s like he was never mayor and never existed.
Yes, you have a point. But take heart and have confidence that we shall, as Richard J. Daley said, “reach greater and greater platitudes of achievement.”
I liked Richard J’s “there’s nothing as wholesome as a fish”.
My local radio weatherman down here in NC has a Bridgeport accent and I go out of my way to listen to his weather forecasts.