Illinois

How teachers’ salary schedules make pay increases misleading

11/27/2012
If you want to begin to understand what’s wrong with our current public school system, look no further than teachers’ salary schedules. Public school teachers unions across Illinois have clung to these outdated pay schemes, despite evidencethat shows salary schedules reward teachers for things that have little to do with improving student outcomes. Still, it is...

Piglet: $200,000 for eco-friendly customized zip lines

By Benjamin VanMetre
11/26/2012
    Providing entertainment may seem like a far cry from an essential government service, but not in Illinois. The Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) doles out hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in grants each year. Funding entertainment is one of the many ways in which this money is used. The...

Illinois cannot afford a state-funded health insurance exchange

By Jonathan Ingram
11/26/2012
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, or PPACA, permits but does not require states to establish new bureaucracies, known as health insurance exchanges, to regulate the purchase of government-approved health insurance from government-approved insurance companies. But whether the state decides to create its own exchange, defer to the federal government or create a state-federal...

Pensions and the Civic Committee

11/21/2012
Illinois has a long history of fake reforms – legislative proposals that promise to solve the great policy challenges of the day when passed, but never actually accomplish these goals. There is perhaps no bigger fake reform than the 1995 pension ramp passed by the Republican-controlled General Assembly and signed into law by former Gov....

What you need to know about Quinn and AFSCME

By Paul Kersey
11/21/2012
Q: I heard that Gov. Pat Quinn terminated the state’s contract with AFSCME. What just happened? A: The governor’s office announced that it was not going to continue to extend the contract with AFSCME Leadership Council 31. About 40,000 state employees that AFSCME represents are now working without a contract. Q: How did we get...

Illinois unemployment rate remains stagnant while neighboring states see improvement

By Ted Dabrowski, John Klingner
11/21/2012
Illinois’ unemployment rate remained at a stagnant 8.8 percent in October, unchanged since September and still far above the national unemployment rate of 7.9 percent. Adding only a paltry 4,800 jobs last month, the state has been stuck in neutral, at best. Illinois’ neighbors, on the other hand, are watching their unemployment rates drop. They’re...

Illinoisans foot $2.3 million cable bill for state inmates

By Benjamin VanMetre
11/21/2012
When families in Illinois need to tighten their belts, cable TV is often one of the first expenses to go. A state nearing bankruptcy should do the same. The Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) racked up a cable bill of $2,261,009 between July 2010 and June 2012. Popular channels included in this bill were MTV,...

Hostess’ labor problems run deep

By Paul Kersey
11/21/2012
At the behest of a bankruptcy judge, Hostess Brands got a short reprieve from liquidation in the form of one final meeting between management and union officials. But with the mediation failing and no more meetings scheduled, the company’s 18,500 workers (about 1,400 of them in Illinois) are almost certain to lose their jobs. A...

Union perks prevent the upward mobility of all Illinoisans

By Benjamin VanMetre
11/21/2012
Families in Illinois are struggling to afford higher education for their children. Incoming undergraduate students have seen tuition and mandatory fees at Illinois’ public universities increase by more than 60 percent since 2004. But that’s not the only problem. The government expects families to pick up the education bill for state employees, too. The Upward Mobility Program, available...

Twinkies, Ho Hos and the future of Illinois state pensions

By Ted Dabrowski
11/20/2012
If Illinoisans want a glimpse of the state’s upcoming fiscal cliff, they should look no further than the failed negotiations between the maker of Twinkies and the unions that took them on. Hostess Brand’s bankruptcy is much more than the demise of famous brands like Twinkies, Ho Hos and Wonder Bread. It’s also the tragedy...
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FAQ: How the federal scholarship program would help Illinois students

Illinois students could soon benefit from scholarship money to help them find a tutor, attend ACT or SAT prep sessions, pay tuition, get special education services or assist with other academic needs. That will happen in Illinois only if Gov. J.B. Pritzker lets the state’s schoolchildren benefit from the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit program, established...

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Diana Graham

Process for unionizing non-state workers raises red flags

By Paul Kersey
06/19/2014

CBS Chicago: Illinois’ highest-paid superintendent receives $400K per year to oversee 1,200 students

By Ted Dabrowski
05/02/2016