The more I read about state and local government pensions in Illinois, the worse it gets. Many municipal police and fire pension funds are so woefully underfunded, for example, that they are likely to go up in smoke in not-too-many years.

The basic problem with all underfunded government pensions is that elected officials like to do things for people, especially things that don’t have any immediate political cost, that is, don’t absolutely require current payment for a deferred benefit.

As many readers know, the Illinois state government pension funds are the worst financed in the nation. Bank giant J.P. Morgan projects that the state will have to devote 40 percent of all its revenues for years to come in order to bring the funds up to self-sufficiency and also cover retiree health benefits.

Due to higher demand for ridesharing services such as Uber and Lyft, taxi drivers are losing out on a market they used to dominate.

That’s not the fault of the ridesharing phenomenon – it’s because the city won’t remove the shackles it places on drivers.

Chicago City Council passed an ordinance late last year that takes a Band-Aid approach to treating cab drivers more fairly. The city’s tactic was to get more involved in the taxi industry by creating a universal cab-hailing app, lowering lease rates and cutting fines, among other adjustments, according to Progress Illinois.

The Illinois Supreme Court is scheduled in March to hear arguments on the constitutionality of 2013 pension reform legislation approved by state lawmakers but challenged in court by public employee unions.

On the evening of Gov. Bruce Rauner’s inauguration, the pomp had given way to a rollicking concert in Springfield’s large convention center.

The heavily scripted ceremony earlier on Monday saw the new governor compared to Abraham Lincoln and revered Roman dictator Cincinnatus, reminders of the lofty expectations Republicans have for the new administration.

But along with the concert’s plentiful free beer came a more sobering message.

The Kane County coroner’s office went more than $123,000 over budget in 2014, according to a year-end financial report released Friday.

The majority of the extra expenses fell into three main categories: About $32,200 for per diem salaries, or daily employee allowances for off-hour calls; about $37,700 for extra autopsies performed during the year and about $35,100 for fees paid to DuPage County, where forensic operations were outsourced for the past six months while the Kane County morgue underwent renovations.

Other areas of extra spending included financial consulting — costing about $7,600 — and fuel for the coroner’s office’s vehicles — which cost about $7,200, according to the report provided by the Kane County auditor.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spent a significant amount of time in Chicago fighting City Hall, school segregation, open-housing issues and backlash from whites throughout the city.

One of King’s biggest impacts was the Chicago Freedom Movement, which fought against deplorable conditions that blacks were forced to live in because of housing segregation. And that fight helped bring about the Fair Housing Act, which was enacted on April 11, 1968 — less than a week after King’s assassination.