Here is a chart that breaks down household spending of the average Midwestern household by category. We ask Governor Quinn and would-be tax hike supporters: What should families cut from their household budgets to make room for higher tax bills?
A bill targeting online retailers like Amazon.com is moving through the Illinois Senate.
The Problem Illinois is in a fiscal meltdown that continues to spiral out of control. We began the year with $4 billion in leftover unpaid bills, and we are likely to end the year with nearly $6 billion. This financial mess could have been avoided if reasonable spending and regulatory reforms had been put into...
Tired of scouring the web for records of state budgets in years passed? The Illinois Policy Institute has archived budgets from fiscal year 2005 here for your convenience.
Setting bad precedent?
A plank in the Institute's Economic Reform Agenda got a vote in the House. It's a good idea; here's why.
On February 23, Kristina Rasmussen testified before the Illinois Senate Appropriations Committee on the State Budget. Download her complete testimony here.
In 2009, the CTA received $25 million in direct funding from the state but it still needed to cut service to close a budget deficit after union workers refused to return a 3.5% pay raise.
Illinois spent at least $813,653,009.72 on purchases from other states.
$6,500 for a tub of live bass? $78,066 for quail promotion? $353,165 for car racing? Does this sound like a budget for a state in dire fiscal straits?
State budget transparency on the way?
The Problem State spending in Illinois has skyrocketed over the past decade, increasing 39 percent from 1998 to 2008 (after inflation). “Appropriated Funds Expenditures” include general, highway, special state, bond financed, debt service, federal trust, revolving funds, and state trust funds. Illinois’s population growth has been minimal, increasing just under 7 percent between 1998 and...
“The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas, and throw the bad ones away.” So said Linus Pauling, the two-time Nobel Prize winner for chemistry. A lot of ideas have been suggested to solve Illinois’s budget shortfall, and it’s time to separate the good from the bad. According to the National...
Governor Pat Quinn claims that $3.2 billion in new personal and corporate income tax receipts are necessary to put Illinois’s budget back in the black. In a down economy, however, the last thing that families and businesses need to worry about is the dangling noose of higher taxes. The Illinois Policy Institute recently released an...