Illinoisans pay one of the highest sales tax rates in the nation when local and state sales taxes are averaged. The average rate of 8.83% was up slightly from a year earlier.
Illinoisans will pay nearly one-third more in taxes during their lives than the average American. They will pay almost double what Indiana and Kentucky residents will pay.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed Democrats’ partisan legislative and judicial redistricting plans. He had repeatedly promised to veto any maps drawn by state lawmakers for their own benefit.
Illinois’ decade of population loss, with last year being the worst loss of people since World War II, will cost is one seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Some thought the new Census would cost Illinois two seats in Congress.
Because of delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. Census Bureau will not have the data for states’ political redistricting until the end of September. Illinois faces problems likely to land any political maps in court.
Illinois’ pension crisis has been a growing problem for decades, and its negative effects on state residents are well documented.1 Economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and related government shutdown orders threaten to bring that long-running crisis closer to its breaking point. The state’s five pension systems collectively held nearly $139 billion of debt at...