Audio: Wirepoints’ Mark Glennon says Chicago pension buyout plan mostly shifts debt rather than eliminating it, property tax surge doubles inflation over three decades – Chicago’s Morning Answer
April 3, 2026
9 Comments
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.
Illinois lost another 54,000 tax filers and dependents, net, according to the IRS. Since 2000, fleeing taxpayers have taken $94 billion of annual adjusted gross income with them.
Nothing going to happen. Crime is set in stone for a generation. No job skills, no jobs, and crime is easy. The only hope is the new immigrants will bring the Chitty back from the bottom.
This is great and how stuff gets done! I love it.
? Nothing has gotten done. It’s not like they’re going to shut down or stop building the refugee camp. They’ll give the deplorables even more camps until morale improves
Throughout history, never has an appeal to the king/tsar done jack. West Town overwhelmingly voted for “soft-on-crime” candidates. They got it. No sympathy from me.