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.
How do we reconcile giving employees raises and pension COLA’s while begging others for money? Illinois is like the son asking his parents for a loan to cover his car payment, then purchasing new rims.