If you live in Illinois and have private insurance – either through your employer or purchased on your own – your premiums likely increased this year as a result of the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as ObamaCare. Instead of reducing premiums by an average of $2,500 per family as promised, ObamaCare has increased what...
401(k)-style retirement plans have become America’s primary retirement vehicle. In 1985, only one in 10 Fortune 100 companies offered 401(k)-style retirement plans to their employees. Today, seven in 10 Fortune 100 companies provide only defined-contribution, 401(k)-style retirement plans to new employees. This trend is in line with the private sector overall, where nearly 85 percent of...
The taxi industry complains endlessly that ridesharing services such as UberX and Lyft are hurting its business. Now an AFL-CIO-affiliated group of Chicago cab drivers is seeking to improve its members’ fortunes by pushing the city to mandate higher taxi fares. But hiking prices doesn’t seem like a good way to save an industry that...
Illinois is often seen as the poster child when it comes to bloated government, wasteful spending and public corruption. As a recent WICS news story highlighted, Illinois’ capital bill is a perfect example of why the state holds such a reputation: the state budget is chock full of wasteful spending and pet projects. Take Decatur...
The problem When the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as ACA or ObamaCare, was first implemented, more than three out of 10 physicians across the country were not accepting new patients in Medicaid, a joint state-federal program that is meant to cover the costs of providing health care to the poor. But rather than offering...
Since the Great Recession began, Illinois’ workforce participation has dropped more than that of any other state in the Midwest. That means that working-age Illinoisans have given up and left the workforce more rapidly than in surrounding states. A full 3.9 percent of Illinois’ adult population has quit the workforce since January 2008. The state’s...
An online transparency bill inspired by the shocking Rita Crundwell corruption scandal that cost Dixon, Ill. taxpayers more than $53 million will take effect starting Jan. 1, 2015. House Bill 5503, introduced by state Rep. Tom Demmer, R-Dixon, will require Illinois counties and municipalities to be more transparent about how they spend taxpayer dollars. The...
Perusing Gov. Pat Quinn’s website, one can easily find calls for increasing Illinois’ minimum wage to $10 from $8.25. Just a few clicks away is an application to work for the governor, full time: for free. If Quinn did what he says he wants every Illinois employer to do – pay these workers $10 an...
The problem Skyrocketing retirement costs for Illinois’ state and local government workers are wreaking havoc on governments’ ability to provide core services such as public safety, education and infrastructure. States and cities across the nation continue to struggle with massive pension and health-care costs, which force residents to pay higher taxes and fees to receive...
According to cancer-patient advocate Robert Goldberg, “The latest innovation in cancer care isn’t a medical breakthrough but an app to ration new drugs. It’ll measure care in terms of what it costs health plans, instead of what it means for patients’ lives.” This “innovation” may be used to conceal the best-available cancer treatment options from...
In a creative-accounting maneuver that would make Wall Street proud, Chicago Public Schools’ leadership fashioned a 14-month year for fiscal year 2015. CPS is adding 60 days to its 2015 calendar, allowing it to “generate” one-time revenues of nearly $650 million – just enough to cover its skyrocketing pension costs and help balance its budget....
Since the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in Harris v. Quinn, union supporters – including many politicians who have benefitted from union support themselves – have written articles and statements bemoaning the decision. These pieces have been notable for the things they don’t talk about: who the plaintiffs actually were and what the court...
Standard & Poor’s Rating Services revised Illinois’ credit outlook to “negative” from “developing” on July 23. Illinois’ current S&P rating is A-, the lowest of any state in the country. With this revision, S&P and the other major rating agency in the country, Moody’s Investors Service, are once again on the same page. Both companies...
Pennsylvania is the latest state to receive a Moody’s Investors Service credit downgrade. The drop was largely due to the state’s growing pension crisis. Moody’s issued the following statement with its credit downgrade of Pennsylvania to Aa3 from Aa2: “The downgrade of the general obligation rating to Aa3 reflects the commonwealth’s growing structural imbalance …...