Quinn freezes legislators’ pay over pension reform impasse
Lawmakers on the Illinois General Assembly’s pension conference committee failed to meet Gov. Pat Quinn’s July 9 deadline to resolve the differences between the various pension reform proposals on the table. At a press conference Wednesday, Quinn announced that he is freezing legislators’ pay until they come up with a comprehensive pension solution. Quinn said he won’t collect...
Lawmakers on the Illinois General Assembly’s pension conference committee failed to meet Gov. Pat Quinn’s July 9 deadline to resolve the differences between the various pension reform proposals on the table.
At a press conference Wednesday, Quinn announced that he is freezing legislators’ pay until they come up with a comprehensive pension solution. Quinn said he won’t collect his paycheck while legislators work on a pension solution, either. His $177,412 salary makes him the fourth-highest paid governor in the country.
This isn’t likely to go over well with lawmakers, whose salaries are the fifth-highest in the countryamong state legislators.
According to data from the state comptroller’s state employee salary database, the average salary of a state representative in 2012, including additional leadership pay, was $72,591. The average salary of a state senator in 2012, including additional leadership pay, was $77,545.
But some earn more. House Speaker Mike Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton both made $90,930 in 2012.
On top legislators’ generous salaries, they also continue to pay much less into their pensions than taxpayers do.
Lawmaker contributions to the General Assembly Retirement System, or GARS, have gone up by 33 percent since 1998 – but during the same time period, taxpayer contributions to legislators’ retirements increased by 237 percent.
Illinois taxpayers contributed nearly $9 million more to GARS than legislators did in 2009 alone.
And this gap is projected to widen further – between 2013 and 2045, taxpayers’ annual contributions to GARS are projected to increase by 226 percent, to $46.3 million. Legislator contributions, on the other hand, will rise 237 percent, to only $5.4 million.
These ballooning pension costs are exactly what the pension conference committee was charged with resolving.