Government Budgets

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State Pension Liabilities Rise Due to Lower Expected Investment Returns

  After experiencing several years of poor market conditions, three of the five Illinois State employee retirement funds have reduced their expected rate of return on investments. This rate, also known as the discount rate, is used to…

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Stop Pension Borrowing

As explained in its recent analysis of the State of Illinois FY2011 proposed budget, the Civic Federation opposes the practice of supplying money to the State…

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City of Chicago Budget Continues Structural Deficit Tradition

Today the Civic Federation released its analysis of the City of Chicago’s proposed FY2011 budget of nearly $6.…

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City of Chicago FY2011 Proposed Budget: Analysis and Recommendations

The Civic Federation opposes the proposed FY2011 City of Chicago budget of nearly $6.2 billion because it does not effectively address the structural deficit and relies too heavily on asset lease reserve funds and debt restructuring to…

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Civic Federation: FY2011 Chicago Budget Does Not Address City's Structural Deficit

The Civic Federation announced today that it opposes the $6.2 billion FY2011 City of Chicago budget because it does not do enough to address the City’s structural deficit. Instead it relies upon long-term asset lease funds and other non-…

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Did Illinois’ Budget Rise or Fall Over the Past Two Years?

An issue in this year’s election campaign for Illinois Governor has concerned the State’s budgetary trends since FY2009. Different conclusions can be reached depending on which numbers are included in the analysis. Counting pension…

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Civic Federation says Cook County can cut taxes and balance budget

In this blog post, Greg Hinz examines some of the recommendations in the Civic Federation’s Cook County Modernization Report.

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Report: Cook County Board Should Repeal Sales Tax Hike

On this segment of the City Room news program, Civic Federation President Laurence Msall says the next Cook County Board President should roll back the Cook County sales tax increase of 2008, a recommendation found in the Federation’s…

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Candidate Forum: Cook County Board President

 This segment of the “Chicago Tonight” news program features a roundtable discussion with the three candidates for Cook County Board President. The candidates discuss recommendations made by the Civic Federation’s…

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Modernization Report Calls for Increased Transparency in Cook County’s Operations

On Monday the Civic Federation released the Cook County Modernization Report, which provided leaders of Cook County with ideas for improving and reshaping county…