Since 2020, the state’s job market has struggled to recover from the pandemic, ending 2025 as just one of 16 states to shed jobs over the last year to now rank No. 46 in the country in job recovery over the last five years. By comparison, four of the six neighboring states (Missouri, Iowa, Indiana and Wisconsin) ended 2025 with an unemployment rate below 4 percent.
A largely unasked question is becoming glaring: Is Illinois doing all it should to use artificial intelligence to make government cost less and work better? So far, the evidence says no.