Much attention is rightly being paid to how city policy can address the need to provide young people with meaningful opportunities for work. The stakes couldn’t be higher.
“I came to the realization while I was incarcerated that I had to make some serious, life-changing decisions. I had obviously made a bad career choice. I made a conscious effort and decision to turn my life around.”
Illinois state lawmakers had tried to bump their pay by 5.5%, but that violated the state constitution. The must settle for 5%, meaning they will make nearly $90,000 a year.
Illinois’ rainy-day fund is at an all-time high, but remains $6.6 billion less than recommended by state budget experts. Illinois state government can operate for fewer than 13 days on what it’s saved.
Independence Day means residents of 47 states will celebrate their freedom by choosing to set off fireworks. Not in Illinois.
This edition of The Policy Shop comes from policy analyst Hannah Max. The New York Times shocked many readers when it reported last week that student test scores in our public schools aren’t great. To some of us, this was unsurprising. Still, it’s bad. “The math and reading performance of 13-year-olds in the United States has...
Illinoisans will notice more expensive food July 1 when Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s election-year suspension of the grocery tax expires. Only Illinois and 12 other states will tax groceries then.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruling in favor of Illinois state worker Mark Janus in 2018 gave government workers the ability to stop funding government union politics. Chastened unions could have reformed. Instead, they got extreme.
Illinoisans face the second gas tax hike of 2023 on July 1. The 3.1 cent hike doesn’t need lawmaker approval, thanks to state leaders implementing automatic gas tax hikes.
In 2013, Chicago closed 50 nearly empty schools. Since then, the CTU has barred charters and other schools from using these empty buildings to provide schooling options for local students. After railing against these school closures, CTU leadership locked students out of full-time, in-person learning for 17 months during 2020-21.
Illinois celebrated its highest graduation rate in a decade. But high school student proficiency and average SAT scores are dropping as chronic absenteeism increases across the state.
This edition of The Policy Shop is by Mailee Smith, staff attorney and senior director of labor policy. On this fifth anniversary of U.S. Supreme Court justices issuing their ruling in Janus v. AFSCME, we’re witnessing a radical transformation in the labor movement and of government unions across America. The Supreme Court’s ruling. In their decision, justices acknowledged...