Chicago and other urban areas in Illinois gained people compared to the rural areas, with 87 of 102 counties losing people in the 2020 U.S. Census.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said his reelection campaign will focus on his record of protecting people and their jobs. A close look at that record shows Illinois with worse employment prospects and greater racial disparities than the rest of the U.S.
Some parts of Illinois’ job markets are recovering, but not for Black Illinoisans. Many jobs are still missing from before COVID-19, including over one-third of the leisure and hospitality jobs.
New census data shows Illinois ranked 48th in the U.S. for new single-family home permits during the past decade.
When a child’s lemonade stand was targeted by government regulators, an 11-year-old entrepreneur fought back. Now Illinois law officially bars government from interfering with a child’s right to sell cold summer drinks.
A national study ranked Chicago’s unemployment recovery 172nd out of the 180 most-populous U.S. cities. Lawmakers didn’t help when they imposed $655 million in new taxes on the state’s job creators.
To combat above-average unemployment, Illinois state leaders discussed a possible back-to-work bonus. The state would pay cash to those who go off unemployment.
Illinois shed 7,900 jobs in May but most of those losses were outside of urban areas.
Illinois lost jobs in May as the state’s workers found themselves facing a tougher job hunt than workers in other states.
State lawmakers passed a bill allowing local governments to waive licensing fees and registration costs for businesses harmed by the COVID-19 pandemic, but it won’t spare them from state taxes.
Historic unemployment payouts related to the COVID-19 shutdowns left Illinois’ fund billions in the hole. State leaders did nothing to fix it, meaning there could be reduced benefits for the unemployed or higher taxes on employers trying to recover.
Illinois saw six of 11 major industries shrink payrolls in May as the nation continued to regain jobs lost during the COVID-19 recession.
Eight of 13 Illinois-based metro areas lost jobs in April.
Illinois was among the nation’s worst for delays in helping gig workers and the self-employed receive pandemic assistance unemployment payments, a federal audit found. Rampant fraud and inadequate reporting was also discovered nationwide.