Most business is mobile. Most of Illinois is close to another state. Add a progressive state income tax and watch businesses such as Piasa Motor Fuels cross the bridge to Missouri.

The last state to take Pritzker’s path should serve as a bright red flag to Illinoisans weighing whether to back him.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker has pointed admiringly to other Midwestern states’ progressive income tax structures, but taxes on the median Illinois family would go up under all of them.

Illinois is one of just a handful of states that double-taxes people when they die by imposing its own estate tax atop the federal tax. A bill that would repeal Illinois’ estate tax could save family farms.

Illinois already taxes 20 cents more per gallon of gasoline than Missouri. If state lawmakers add another 30 cents per gallon, expect an exodus of southwestern Illinois drivers buying gas and more in St. Louis.

While J.B. Pritzker has not released a detailed tax plan of his own, reasonable cost estimates suggest the tax hike required to pay for the candidate’s spending promises would require doubling Illinois’ state income tax rate and cost the state an estimated 132,000 jobs and $31.3 billion in forgone GDP.

A proposed 1 percent sales tax for school facilities improvements would bring the city of Springfield’s combined sales tax rate to 9.75 percent – among the highest in the nation.