Chicago City Council claims that over 400,000 workers in Chicago will get pay hikes. What lawmakers should be studying is how many tens of thousands of those workers are going to be unnecessarily thrown out of work the next time the economy slows down, property taxes go up or a new technology comes along that can replace human labor.
Illinois’ economy needs a real comeback to get the state back to work. To address what is needed for a sustainable recovery, policymakers should look at one of Illinois’ primary pain points: the manufacturing sector. The recession caused Illinois to lose 116,800 manufacturing jobs from January 2008-January 2010. After that, Illinois began a weak manufacturing...
The Illinois unemployment rate fell to 6.6 percent from 6.7 percent in September, according to today’s economic release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The number of payroll jobs in Illinois increased by 19,300 in September, the sixth-best monthly increase in the last 10 years. Illinois’ workforce grew by 5,800 in September, the first month...
Illinois is ready to boom. That is the single most important fact about Illinois’ jobs climate and economy as a whole. However, Illinoisans have been held back by policy errors that have plagued the state for decades, especially since the Great Recession. Policy errors are causing tremendous pain for Illinoisans, but that pain can be...
From the beginning of the Great Recession in January 2008 through August 2014, Illinois is still down 157,100 payroll jobs, more than any other state in the U.S. Some sectors of Illinois’ economy have recovered completely, while others remain dramatically below pre-recession levels. Manufacturing and construction have had it the worst through the recession era,...
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...