State workers receive a platinum-level health care plan at a heavily subsidized cost, while Illinoisans in the private sector paying for those plans see their own premiums skyrocket.

Illinois parents will pay the Midwest’s highest sales taxes on back-to-school shopping.

AFSCME officials proposed seven tax increases for Cook County as a way to save union jobs, including an increase in the county sales tax, a new head tax and doubling the amusement tax to 6 percent, despite the county’s local tax burden already being among the highest in the nation.

While the Better Government Association has claimed Illinois’ budget contains no fat to trim, a deeper analysis reveals the state has many areas of expensive inefficiency to reform in state and local government costs, the Medicaid program and K-12 education.