General Electric will move its corporate headquarters and 800 jobs to Boston, Mass., from Fairfield, Conn., noting its concerns about Chicago’s government-worker pension debt in its rejection of the Windy City.
The fiscal crises caused by the state’s government-worker pension liabilities.
Taxpayers pay once for state politicians’ salaries and another 1.5 times for their bankrupt pension system. In 2017, taxpayers will contribute the equivalent of nearly $123,000 for each lawmaker just to keep the General Assembly Retirement System afloat.
Diverting taxpayer dollars from pensions to salaries, underfunding pensions, and providing unsustainably high pension benefits have caused Elgin, Illinois’ combined police and firefighter pension shortfalls to double in just nine years to $180 million.
The outsized benefits received by retired government workers under the State Universities Retirement System and the unfair burden this places on taxpayers demonstrate the urgent need to reform Illinois’ government-worker pensions.
Kentucky’s governor-elect wants 401(k)s for new government employees.
Regardless of the outcome of the case, the burden Chicagoans face from the government-worker pension crisis won’t be going away any time soon.
A Cook County judge is scheduled to rule on the constitutionality of Chicago's pension-reform law on July 24. No matter what the outcome is, the pension overhaul will eventually end up in the Illinois Supreme Court. But the ruling may give a clue as to whether or not the city’s reforms will ultimately be upheld.
Chicago’s contributions to its government-worker pension funds will jump to $1 billion in 2016 from $500 million in 2015, according to a new report by Moody’s Investors Service.
A new report by Moody’s Investors Service details Chicago’s weak economic growth and increasing government-worker pension obligations.
Although the Illinois Supreme Court has ruled that altering pension benefits of current government workers violates the Illinois Constitution, there are still actions – from politicians voluntarily reforming their own pension system, to allowing municipal bankruptcy – that Illinois can take to set government-worker pensions on a more fiscally sound path.
Without real reforms, low investment yearly returns of 4 to 6 percent over the next 28 years could cost Illinois taxpayers anywhere from $100 billion to $200 billion above what they’re already expected to pay in contributions.
Illinois Comptroller Leslie Munger announced the state will delay a $560 million pension payment as the state’s government-pension-driven fiscal crisis worsens.
CPS leaders have brought the teachers’ pension fund to the brink of insolvency. Now they’re counting on taxpayers to clean up the mess.