One of my low-probability but plausible surprise predictions for 2025 was that there will be a political crisis in Chicago, and perhaps the whole state of Illinois, on account of the radically deteriorating condition of the city under its radical mayor Brandon Johnson, whose public approval rating is somewhere down in the low teens. Our friends at the Illinois Policy Institute show one of the greatest sources of fiscal ruin in Chicago, but this also applies to Illinois as a whole, as both jurisdictions have become wholly-own subsidiaries of public employee unions:
Illinois Policy notes: “Pension costs are now the single-largest line item in the city’s budget, receiving more tax dollars than the police department, fire department or infrastructure.”
I’m guessing the chances of a federal bailout of zero under President Trump and a Republican Congress.
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