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Our condo was just off Michigan Avenue facing east, with a view of the lake and the Bean. One day my husband said “We need to sell this condo now before property taxes go up and we lose money on it.” I thought he was kidding. He wasn’t. We bought a to-be-built house in Las Vegas in October 2014, moved into that house in September of 2015, and the condo closed in December of that year.
Our cost of living has gone down 40%. Our current property taxes are 1/3rd of what the condo’s taxes currently are. We have no tax on groceries and there’s no state income tax, plus I don’t have to sludge through heat like I did through the snow.
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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About the gerrymandering: how can you gerrymander the popular vote in an entire state? Didn’t your candidate for governor, who advocated for bankruptcy and amending the state constitution, lose by 15 percentage points to the current governor, who explicitly rejected such actions? Elections have consequences. Neither bankruptcy, nor eliminating the pension protection clause, are going to happen until you start winning elections.
They can’t gerrymander a statewide election but they do gerrymander the legislature to obtain a super-majority of votes There’s a ton of fake news out there about how IL isn’t as bad as other states. IL is just as bad. D would likely always win the legislature, but they would never have a super majority, like they’ve had practically my entire life, and especially now.
Ignore it.
Don’t believe your lying eyes.
Just another greedy middle class family.
Everyone is leaving because climate.
Only 39 people killed in Chicago in September so far.
Our legislature and governor has been really busy improving things passing more legislation in the first 8 months than ever before. It must be getting better…….right.
I hope they don’t continue to vote democrat.
oh they will. Cognitive dissonance just doesn’t go away because you move.
Nearly impossible not to vote Dem in Illinois.The system is rigged to their favor. If you don’t vote their in-if you vote on the ballot many candidates run unopposed so if you see (D) and leave it blank they still win. No space for write in candidates. Now add in political boundaries/gerrymandering/redistricting/sham candidates/etc. Is this even legal in other states?
Yes, it is all legal in other states. Illinois is a horribly gerrymandered state in favor of Democrats. However, they will lie to you and say “no its not” and then point to North Carolina or Wisconsin. But those cases are different – because in NC and WI they gerrymandered to give a clear majority to one party (R) even though the total vote count is equally split. Illinois gerrymanders its districts to give the majority party a SUPER MAJORITY in both houses. In my estimation, Illinois is roughly a 55D/45R state (varying by election, candidate, etc), but they’ve managed… Read more »
All great empires eventually go into decline.
We moved out 1 year ago,My the feeling of be a free person in a free state,is great.The whole way of life in illinois in being a serf,not a citizen.Get ready for your increased taxes with all the dems getting what they voted for.They want your money and your life to throw a way on there retarted ways.
An empire in decline is usually taken over by others who recognize political opportunity. The progressives have taken over the state, which is the proof we’re in a decline. The crazy part is that these nuts think we live in a progressive utopia; the state finances are just a minor issue compared to the absolution of the rights of a fetus, or the indoctrination of children with the ‘heroes’ of the gay rights movement. The state has been taken over by secular zealot as bad as the puritans were 400 years ago..
Secular Calvinism, if you will. Only the most woke shall inherit the kingdom of man.