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.
Time to pay the piper. The free lunch program is over.
Ti e to pay the p per. The free program is .
So far WIU has not laid off any administrators. Their Athletic budget is $3.5 million in the hole and no cuts have been made there either.
This type of attitude is typical of the WIU administration and has been for decades. Now the faculty and staff will suffer but not the high paid administrators nor an athletic program that has delusions of grandeur by being in Division I instead of Division II like they should be.
The directional schools are sub-standard these days. Except for a few majors U of I is pretty sub-standard.
Why the shocked surprise… enrollment at WIU has been cratering for years. One reason is a declining rural HS student pool (and a declining IL student pool in general) that traditionally fed admissions, another is that WIU is a mediocre school in the middle of nowhere. They’ve also concentrated on “minority outreach”, but that’s not enough to stanch the bloody sucking wound… it’s simply not a competitive option anymore…
You have stated some very obvious truths.
Its a start. Where’s the Cuts at UofI, NIU, etc? They are all bloated with over paid professors with tenor who can’t be touched. These institutions are unsustainable as they are now.
IIRC only U of I and Illinois State are maintaining decent admissions numbers, the rest of the state schools are in admissions freefall. IL population is declining, sure, but also many IL college students are increasingly attending out – of – state schools. Also, IL college towns suck to start with, so… how much enthusiasm can be drummed up for charmless rural dumps like Charleston, Macomb, Carbondale, etc…
Agreed. These institutions do not understand supply/demand and right-sizing to meet their revenue limitations. They do not get it. They simply keep going in the same direction and wonder why the numbers don’t work out. Then they all get together and formulate some sort of formula calculation that illustrates why the State and tax payers should give them more money. If you do not have the needed enrollment to cover the costs of delivering all of the existing education options, then you need to get rid of the options that do-not-pay. See…no PhD required.
Both of those schools are looking at athletic programs ( and the revenue from television and alumni) in general and football in particular to help keep their coffers full. Those without much of an athletic program with a large fan base are pretty much doomed.
I want to see WIU and macomb collapse simultaneously, they are both culpable. It will be delicious .
Time to pay the piper. The free lunch program is over.