The city’s rating from Fitch is now just one notch above junk status.

The Illinois Supreme Court’s overturning of Chicago’s modest pension reform means Chicago faces higher pension contributions, rapidly growing pension debt and an increased risk of total insolvency for its pension funds.

Despite striking down a pension-reform package aimed at reducing Chicago’s pension debt, the Illinois Supreme Court opened the door for future legislative reforms.

While striking down modest reforms to Chicago city-worker pensions, the Illinois Supreme Court has effectively given state lawmakers the green light on other avenues for pension reform.

The crisis threatens to burden taxpayers with massive, ever-escalating taxes to bail out a system that is not sustainable – government-worker pensions consume a fourth of the state’s budget.

Government-worker union officials filed papers with the Illinois General Assembly in favor of the “pension holiday” that contributed to the state’s $111 billion pension debt.

From 2009 to 2014, the state added $8.9 billion in new tax dollars to the education budget, over and above the base amount of $6.8 billion it spent in 2009. Of those new dollars spent, 89 percent went to retirement costs and just 11 percent made it to classrooms.