by Collin Hitt The construction worker strike in the Chicago area has cost Naperville schools at least $500,000, reports the Daily Herald. Construction crews may be back to work at Naperville Central High School, but the weeklong delay due to a labor strike is likely to cost the district at least $500,000… Work came to...
by Brian Costin On Wednesday, the State of Illinois resorted to more borrowing and sold $900 Million in Build America Bonds to support public works projects. Unfortunately, due to Illinois rapidly deteriorating credit rating taxpayers are paying a premium. On face, the bonds will pay investors an average interest rate of 6.96 percent. Bad enough but...
by Collin Hitt That’s the title of a new Forbes piece by Clayton Christiansen and Michael Horn. School is out, and for most students enjoying their midsummer pleasures, class time is a distant memory. Changes are underway that make it likely to stay that way. Christiansen and Horn have written a book on the topic of “disruptive innovation” in...
Illinois is facing a budget crisis. The state’s revenue collections are low, and dropping. Yet we’ve continued to spend more than we’ve taken in from taxes – in 2006, in 2007, in 2008, in 2009, in 2010, and yes, in 2011. Some of the revenue shortfall can be blamed on falling collections due to a...
by Amanda Griffin-Johnson The U.S. Department of Transportation estimates that the states have spent a total of around $5 million of stimulus funds on signs “touting ‘The American Reinvestment and Recovery Act’ and reminding passers-by that the program is ‘Putting America Back to Work.’” ABC News reports that “the state of Illinois has spent $650,000 on about 950...
by Will Compernolle The State of Illinois hired 9 nuclear safety inspectors in fiscal year 2008 for $635,997 in combined total wages. The average nuclear safety inspector took home an annual salary of $70,666.33 while the highest paid inspector made $73,403. To find this information on our IllinoisOpenGov.org, go to “Payroll” and search “nuclear safety inspector”...
by Rhys Seiffe The State of Illinois paid 12 Benefit Counselors $679,791 in combined total wages in fiscal year 2008. The average salary was $56,649.25, and the highest paid counselor received $79,446. According to the Illinois Teachers Retirement System website, Benefits Counselors “prepare benefit estimates showing your projected pension benefits in different retirement scenarios”. To find this...
by Will Compernolle A court-appointed watchdog group claims Cook County Board President Todd Stroger is “using the county payroll to reward those who backed his failed re-election effort and punish those who did not,” the Chicago Tribune reports. Stroger’s staff has lowered minimum job qualifications, pretended not to know job applicants when they did, tried to invoke...
by Kristina Rasmussen The Center for Individual Freedom (CFIF) is challenging Illinois’s new campaign finance laws. From CFIF’s press release: Center for Individual Freedom Files Federal Lawsuit Challenging Constitutionality of Illinois’ Campaign Finance Law Vagueness of Illinois law and its discriminatory exemption for labor unions violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments ALEXANDRIA, VA — The Center for...
by Kristina Rasmussen If you were amazed that the State of Illinois is handing out pay bumps to tends of thousands of state workers in the midst of a multi-billion dollar budget deficit, get ready for this. Between June 2011 and January 2012, unionized state workers are scheduled to receive a total of 7.25 percent in cost of...
by Kristin Nisbet Robby Stoave referred to the following quote from an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal by Columbia University President Lee Bollinger recently in a post on reason.com. There are examples of other institutions in the U.S. where state support does not translate into official control. The most compelling are our public universities and our...
by Joe O’Malley Contrary to the free-market principle that businesses which make reckless decisions should fail, Chicago Democrats are now petitioning Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to bail out a local community bank. Its name is ShoreBank. According to the New York Times, ShoreBank made business decisions that were very poor: “An ill-timed, overly aggressive expansion at the...
by Collin Hitt John Fund turns in an interesting, short piece on teacher pensions. He interviewed Bill Gates, who has sometimes been soft on education reform but is frustrated with the budget bombs created by teacher pension schemes. Joel Klein, however, turns in the money quote: “The education system is built on the three pillars of...
by Kristina Rasmussen Okay, so what will ObamaCare really mean for you? The Cato Institute’s Michael Tanner recently released a helpful guide: “Bad Medicine: A Guide to the Real Costs and Consequences of the New Health Care Law.” Among the findings: While the bill will increase the number of Americans with insurance coverage, it falls significantly...