Daily Links for April 16

April 16, 2014

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Chicago Reader: When Chicago spent its pension money on the mayor’s pet projects

As we all prepare for Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s proposed property tax hike to pay off billions of dollars in pension obligations, I thought I’d take a trip down memory lane to a not-so-distant era when our leaders acted like we didn’t have a care in the world.

The year was 2004—and what a glorious time it was!

We were in the midst of a fabulous real estate bubble that sent property taxes flowing into the city’s coffers like champagne at an Emanuel fund-raiser.

Amid the good times, a few wealthy friends of then mayor Richard Daley threw a lavish party in the Pritzker Pavilion at the recently completed Millennium Park.

State Rep. Derrick Smith admitted to the FBI that he had pocketed a bribe of $7,000 and even took agents to his home to retrieve $2,500 in bribe money he still had in his possession there, federal prosecutors say in a court filing.

An FBI account of the alleged confession – made public as part of the filing – portrayed Smith as desperate to win his first campaign for state representative, broke and feeling under pressure to raise money to pay campaign workers.

Smith’s lawyers are trying to block his admissions to the FBI in 2012 from his corruption trial, scheduled for late next month. He is accused of accepting $7,000 cash, believing it was from a day care operator in return for writing an official letter supporting the operator’s bid for a $50,000 state grant.

Say you’re scheduled to work at 8 a.m. Instead, you mosey in around 8:50 a.m.. Would you expect to be paid for those first 50 minutes? Moreover, would you expect to still have a job if you regularly showed up late? For most people, the answer to both questions is “no.” But allow me to introduce you to the world of Illinois state government — where not only is such behavior permissible, it’s incentivized.

An alderman, who first told FOX 32 News about his city income tax proposal two weeks ago, offered new details Monday and won praise from the Chicago Teachers Union.

Ald. Bob Fioretti said Chicago does not face a public employee pension crisis. The government funds that write retirees’ checks could soon be broke, but Fioretti called it a revenue crisis. He appealed for a new income tax on the 600,000 commuters he said work in Chicago, but live elsewhere.

“If those people who live outside the city, but work here, paid as little as 1% in their taxes we could generate more than $300 million annually,” Fioretti says. “This could help stabilize our pension funds and reduce class size in CPS schools.”

For the first time, the Obama administration has offered a plan for funding the health-care law’s now somewhat controversial “risk corridors” program, which is meant to shield insurers from major losses if early Obamacare enrollees are less healthy than anticipated.

The Obamacare “risk corridors” provision sounds like the kind of wonky health-care issue that wouldn’t grab too many headlines. But it took center stage a few months ago when the law’s opponents started labeling it an “insurer bailout” and demanded its repeal.

Wonkblog had a previous explainer on how the Affordable Care Act risk corridors provision works, but just to sum up briefly here: It’s one of three programs included in the law intended to ease insurers’ transition to health insurance exchanges.

In Silicon Valley, there’s a lot of talk about The Maker Movement. After all, over 195,000 people attended Maker Faire events around the world last year alone. Makers are tech-savvy tinkerers. They build robots, program light installations and hack everything from code to IKEA furniture. From Boston to Beirut, community-based makerspaces are popping up in libraries, schools, shipping containers and buses as part of a revolution that has people returning to their workshops and building with their hands.

As the co-founder of IDEAco, a nonprofit that works in maker education, a large part of my job is about using maker culture to inspire learning. Exposure to this revolution hooks students on the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) skills necessary to fill jobs in the world’s fastest-growing industries.

Making is a fantastic way to engage many students, but it’s only the first step toward an even greater revolution. If we wish to build a thriving and responsive economy, the future of education cannot be about giving students the skills to fill jobs; it must be about giving them the skills to create jobs. This requires more than technical skills, it requires empathy, context and innovation.

A Brussels court has declared Uber to be illegal in Belgium, saying the company will be fined €10,000 for every ride. The UberPOP ride-sharing service has been on shaky ground there since its February launch, with the government even seizing vehicles. As in France, taxi drivers are taking umbrage with the company since its drivers don’t have to pay for pricey licenses. The French government actually forced Uber chauffeurs to wait 15 minutes before picking up passengers in response, which now seems tame in comparison to Belgium’s actions. Uber has yet to comment, but previously said it’s been open with the government and called the seizures “disproportionate and targeted.” As with Tesla, however, it’s learning how hard it is to deal with an entrenched industry.

State officials are continuing their fight to keep Naperville’s police chief from collecting both a police pension and his chief’s salary.

The Illinois attorney general’s office this week filed an appeal of a DuPage County judge’s ruling that police Chief Bob Marshall doesn’t count as a police officer for pension purposes.

That ruling allows Marshall to collect his $154,775 salary as well as his annual police pension, which currently stands at $104,109.

CARTOON OF THE DAY

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illinoispolicy

Why health insurance will likely be less affordable next year

Only 28% of Illinois residents trust state government, lowest in nation