re: Illinois population hemorrhage; 93/102 (91%) county populations declined last decade

I bolted Chicago for Charlotte 7 years ago and can’t say I miss it a ton. I do miss the restaurant scene and sure it’d be fun to spend a month there in the summer.

But I don’t miss my $10,000 in property taxes on a condo and double digit sales taxes being nickeled and dimed to death with little fees and taxes hidden everywhere.

Plus no matter how much they raise taxes they don’t get any closer to actually being fiscally solvent because they won’t address the pension issue.

Within a couple years pension spending will be over 50% of the general budget. That’s mind boggling.

How does that happen? Well, my aunt was a librarian at a high school in the Chicago burbs. She retired at 55. If she lives to 85 her pension payout will be just about $3 million over those 30 years. And the amount of that $3 million she paid in? Virtually nothing