Illinois government-worker unions demand pay that outstrips that of Illinois private-sector workers and propose numerous tax hikes to fund their contract demands.

The Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board determined there is enough evidence of the illegality of CTU’s April 1 walkout for CPS to pursue a court order to prevent CTU from waging any similar strikes.

The Chicago Teachers Union has threatened to strike as early as April 1 over Chicago Public Schools’ announced plan to stop paying a portion of teachers’ required contributions to their pension fund. Under Illinois labor law, however, CTU cannot legally strike before mid- to late-May.

The Chicago Teachers Union cannot legally strike before completing several procedural steps, which would take four months following failed mediation with Chicago Public Schools; however, the union could flout the law and strike sooner in the hope of pressuring Chicago Public Schools to reach a deal quickly.

The taxpayers footing the bill will be left in the dark until after the contract is finalized.

Waukegan Public Schools have been closed for more than three weeks because of a teacher strike called by the Lake County Federation of Teachers. At this point, the acrimony between the union and the administration must be severe; and the children who attend the district’s schools, along with a lot of teachers, are stuck in...

On February 28, 2013, Illinois’ largest government union, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31, which represents nearly 40,000 state employees, completed months of negotiations with state government over a new contract, yet taxpayers were locked out of the bargaining room during all of them. Since that time, taxpayers are still waiting to...

  [updated Feb. 4, 2013] With the Chicago Teachers Union having waged a largely successful strike against the Chicago Public Schools, we can expect to see other public school unions, and maybe other government employee unions, following their example. Strikes allow unions to preserve costly wages and benefits, or block needed reforms, by shutting down...