If lawmakers continue to balk at building the tools necessary to reform pensions, bankruptcy will be the only way out for communities across the state.

Pension reform is a moral imperative. The alternative is a future in which core services are cut, taxes are raised, and pensioners risk losing what they’ve already been promised as the funds go insolvent.

Illinois’ pension laws are forcing the city of Harvey to pay its creditors through short-term negotiated agreements just to meet payroll.

Central Falls, Rhode Island, filed for bankruptcy largely because of pension debt. If Illinois municipalities can’t meet or lower their pension obligations, they too could face fiscal collapse.

Local governments should structure themselves in a way that best meets the needs of their budget, taxpayers and public employees. And the state should give them the power to do so.

Given they depend on the nation’s worst-funded pension systems for their retirement security, Illinois’ government workers may want to take a look at how a group of Arizona firefighters are responding to pension-fund problems of their own. Arizona’s firefighters fear that out-of-control pension costs could bankrupt cities in Arizona, resulting in cuts to pensions like...

For 33 years, Clyde Tome served the city of Detroit as a firefighter. Every day he was on duty he knew his life was on the line; in one encounter with riot fires, Tome watched a colleague die. Another time, he saw a nearby fireman killed in a random shooting. For his commitment, Tome counted...