ICS Capitol Comments

Budget, Pension & Medicaid.  There’s a good chance that we’ll be hearing a lot about those topics this upcoming year, or at least according to a recent study by the Civic Federation we should be.

The picture isn’t pretty.  According to the study, within 5 years our unpaid bills will reach $34.8 billion which would exceed our expected General Fund revenue by $2 billion.  That means we will probably need to cut services and raise taxes to fix this problem.  Oh, and it’s an election year – so both parties are going to have re-election issues with one or both of those solutions.

Medicaid is being singled out as one of the largest problem points in the report.  Increases of more than 40%  are expected over the next five years, bringing total Medicaid costs over $12 billion.  If you’re not depressed/frustrated/confused enough, here’s some more information for you:

Illinois Confronts ‘Potentially Paralyzing’ Backlog of Bills — Business Week
Worst. News. Ever. — The Capitol Fax
Civic Federation foresees $35 billion in state IOUs — Crains: Chicago Business
AFSCME Response Letter
Sharing the Pension Burden — The Southtown Star
“The” Report — Civic Federation
Press Release – Civic Federation