New Book: Operation Drain the Swamp
This new book, Operation Drain the Swamp, looks good — it’s now on my to read list. Here is text from the email promo I received regarding it: It’s about time the American people…
Read MoreGovernment Employee Pensions/Pay
Retired Kane County Water District Employee Has Banked $3.5 Million in Pension Payments
How do you lose the information war when stories like this abound about how much government retirees have banked? Through amazing incompetence. Illinois Republicans need new party and legislative leaders. Here is Joe Kaiser writing…
Read MoreReport: Public retirement costs to blame for high property taxes
By Cole Lauterbach: The report also highlighted some of the consequences of high property taxes, especially if those dollars don’t enhance the value of the property.
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Pensions Make Illinois Property Taxes Among Nation’s Most Painful
They are painful, and that’s why so many people are leaving this state. The question I have is, how in the heck can Illinois Republicans continue to fail to make this issue front and…
Read MoreTeachers’ Union Cheers Bill For Illinois To Fund More Pension Spiking
By Mark Glennon: “Spiking” is when a government employer jacks up an employee’s salary just before retirement to likewise jack up the pension the employee will get.
Read MoreUnsustainable: The Government Pension Pickle that Several States are Facing
By James Murphy: In Illinois, an infant coming into the world today owes more than $11,000.00 to the state’s bloated public employees’ pension systems.
Read MoreState, local pension news getting worse
By Jim Dey: Researchers from Wirepoints.com have released a report documenting how increasingly unaffordable promises are wreaking financial havoc on public pensions systems and communities from coast to coast. This week, the Illinois Policy Institute,…
Read More15 Former Chicago Alderman Collecting 6-Figure Pensions
By Eddie Damstra: In the midst of Chicago’s $36 billion pension crisis, former city officials are seeing big payouts.
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The Blue-State Housing Bubble
Too bad our state’s Republicans have no clue what to do about this or how to make more voters aware of this housing bubble. Here is Michael Bargo, Jr. using our state to show…
Read MoreNew Study: The Public Pension Crisis Is Not The Result Of Legislators’ Failure To Fund
By Elizabeth Bauer: A study by Wirepoints made available on their website yesterday points to a far more troubling cause: the value of promised benefits has skyrocketed in the years since 2003, both in…
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Overpromising has crippled public pensions. A 50-state survey
Overpromising public pensions is the problem — yet few if any Republicans in Illinois seem to want to make an issue about it.
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Public Union: Public Enemy
Some of us have been writing about the fact that public union = public enemy for a very long time. The damage that those unions have done makes them well deserving of the word…
Read MoreWhere Illinois’ skyrocketing pension promises came from
By Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner: Wirepoints’ recent commentary on Illinois’ skyrocketing pension benefits — “Janus v AFSCME and the truth about Illinois pensions” — left many readers questioning where that massive growth in…
Read More6 Big Changes Coming To Public Schools And Politics Thanks To The Supreme Court’s Union Smashdown
By Joy Pullmann: Every state is now essentially a right to work state. It’s not an overstatement to say this ruling is a death knell for unions as we know them, and will dramatically…
Read MoreWhat the Supreme Court’s new majority means for Illinois’ fiscal mess
By Mark Glennon: The U.S. Supreme Court could have the deciding say on a number of state issues.
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