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IDOT spends $143,000 on zombie-themed seat belt ad

This article was written by Patrick Yeagle and featured in the Illinois Times on October 16, 2014.  In a dusty, dimly-lit warehouse, a horde of zombies closes in two men with high-powered firearms trying in vain to escape through a stuck door. The men radio for help, and outside, an armored car that looks like something...

Fox Chicago: Illinois continues to struggle with job growth

Our Director of Jobs and Growth, Michael Lucci, joined Fox Chicago to talk about a new jobs report for Illinois. Watch the video here. 

Illinois’ Cell Phone Tax Among Highest in Nation

This article was originally featured on NBC Chicago on October, 13, 2014.  Illinois has one of the highest cell phone taxes in the country, according to a new report from the Tax Foundation. Americans pay an average of 17.05 percent in combined federal, state and local tax and fees on wireless service. This is typically...

Minorities: Group Most Effected By Recession

Our Director of Jobs and Growth, Michael Lucci, joined WICD to discuss the Illinois Policy Institute’s research on employment among different demographics in the state.  Read more. 

Focus on the promises of Obamacare

This article was written by Naomi Lopez Bauman and featured in the Chicago Tribune on October 10, 2014.  Tribune reporter Michelle Manchir’s article “Quinn now in front on Obamacare; With numbers in, governor touts health care success” (News, Oct. 1) fails to evaluate two important aspects of the Affordable Care Act. The first is Gov....

Minorities: Group Most Effected By Recession

Illinois Policy Institute research on the ongoing and harmful effects of the recession and slow recovery for minorities and young people in Illinois was featured in a story by Angelica Sanchez of WICD 15 in Champaign. See the full story at wcid15.com    

‘Gone Girl’ notwithstanding, Missouri taxpayers should stay out of the film business

If you watch the movie “Gone Girl” and enjoy it, be sure to thank the people sitting around you. Assuming that you’re in a Missouri theater, many of them helped pay for the film even before they bought tickets. Missouri taxpayers provided 20th Century Fox with $2.36 million in subsidies for “Gone Girl,” which stars...

Slow Job Growth In Illinois

Startling new data reveals just how long Illinoisans will have to wait for the state to have a decent job market, since the end of the 2009 recession. It will take a minimum of seven years for the state to rebuild its job market to where it was per-recession. The study was conducted by the Illinois...