What Voters Want – Pension Reform: Charting Illinois’s Pension Crisis

A January poll asked likely Illinois voters how the state should address its increasing pension payment. Sixty-four percent of respondents said that benefits for current public employees should be reformed to work within the state’s financial constraints. Earlier this year, lawmakers passed a record 67 percent tax hike. At the time, taxpayers were told the...

A January poll asked likely Illinois voters how the state should address its increasing pension payment. Sixty-four percent of respondents said that benefits for current public employees should be reformed to work within the state’s financial constraints.

Earlier this year, lawmakers passed a record 67 percent tax hike. At the time, taxpayers were told the tax increase was needed to protect public services, but the Illinois Comptroller recently revealed that all of the revenue from the tax hike will be needed to pay for public employee pensions. This was not what the people of Illinois wanted.