-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
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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Nothing in this report incentivizes business to locate in Illinois. The tenets contained therein actually do the exact opposite. Illinois politicians seem to embrace only policies designed to make doing business in Illinois more expensive than surrounding states, much less states who show themselves to be hungry for development, unlike Illinois. The blue states continue to bleed jobs and taxpayers daily, even while pursuing policies that accelerate the exodus.
With so-called leaders like this, Illinois is doomed.
Holy crap. This report by a so-called neutral commission basically reads like a love letter to organized labor. With the exception of this from the manufacturers: Illinois manufacturers employ more than 560,000 women and men on factory floors today in jobs that average more than $88,000 in wages and benefits. Manufacturing contributes the single largest share of the state’s economy. Ninety-two percent of manufacturing workers have some form of employer-provided health care. While manufacturing, agribusiness, and the life science and healthcare are designated in the state’s economic focus, they are largely ignored in this report or deemed to no longer… Read more »