-- 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.
SIGN UP HERE FOR OUR FREE WIREPOINTS DAILY NEWSLETTER
Once again, any property tax relief to the taxpayer would be offset by increased taxes and user fees elsewhere; so, this task force is just for show.
Yes, this is indeed creating political leverage. The democrats plan on promoting the message that “we can’t solve the property tax problem until we have a progressive income tax.” They will force the low-information voters into this Trojan horse to get their tax, but do very little about property taxes. After all, the public unions won’t allow it, and the legislators and governor answer to them. There is no solution until the public unions are told no, and their compensation and numbers cut. That will not happen in this state. Also, in the Tribune version of this article there was… Read more »
Yes, the same legislative super-minority that the Trib claims are the grateful beneficiaries of Democratic gerrymandering that gives Republicans a whopping 11 uncontested seats in southern Illinois. Repubs are the D’s favorite whipping boy so to speak, and no wonder the party sucks so bad, there’s no good people who even want to run for office under the R banner.
The voters in my district voted for a bond to renovate perfectly functional schools. An extra $100 per year per $100,000 value of the home for the term of the 20 year bond aka perpetuity. It passed 61/39. In any other non-blue wave year it would have never passed. The same people who complain about property taxes and complain they are being taxed out of their homes are the same idiots who voted to increase their own taxes multiple times in 2018, first with JB, then with this bond issue. Except my tiny precinct of 400 voters, we were the… Read more »
Most if not all of those who voted for the increase are probably recipients of those tax dollars like school district employees and their families/contractors and their families and so on. In an older article from Imprimis then Gov Chris Christie changed school referendums from March primaries to the general election because March primaries historically have the lowest voter turnout and school employees voted en masse and usually always won what they wanted. Referendums then were not as easily passed since voters had more time to digest where their tax $$ are going. Check out John Stossel’s Stupid in America… Read more »
so true, so true. Good points bond issues would be in the spring, off year municipal elections.