Many of the public sector unions in Illinois are advocating for this and many other sources of revenue.

Another source of revenue for which they are advocating is making the temporary income tax hike permanent.

Another source of revenue for which they are advocating is a progressive income tax which would increase tax revenues overall.

And the list goes on and on.

And the main deficit hole the public sector unions are trying to fill is the state unfunded pension liability.

The unfunded pension liability is blamed mainly on the state not making its required contribution.

That’s not the main reason for the unfunded pension liability, despite the claim by COGFA.

The main reason for the unfunded pension is pension is pension benefits were increased by the Illinois General Assembly and Governors.

New state laws were created in 38 of 40 years between 1971 – 2011 to hike pension benefits.

In those very same years, the State if Illinois seldom made its required contribution.

If pension benefits are hiked, and revenues are not, the result is dumped into the State of Illinois contribution bucket.

Which is a perfect example of how the unfunded liability became out of control.

In those four DECADES, the State was annually shorting the State pension contribution while simultaneously hiking the State contribution amount.

There should be a state law, you cannot create a state law to increase pension benefits if there is an unfunded pension liability in that pension fund.

The public sector unions and politicians and Governors knew they were advocating for, legislating, and signing pension hiking laws when they were not making required pension contributions, yet they continued the practice for FORTY YEARS.

The unions and politicians overall are not advocating to solve the pension IOU by rolling back the pension benefit hikes.

A main reason for that is one dysfunctional sentence which was added to the Illinois State Constitution in 1970 whose result was that pension hiking laws could be created, but once created, they cannot be diminished or impaired, and the laws do not have to be funded, and the laws can be created even if the existing pensions were not being properly funded.

“Membership in any pension or retirement system of the State, any unit of local government or school district, or any agency or instrumentality thereof, shall be an enforceable contractual relationship, the benefits of which shall not be diminished or impaired.”

So THIRTY EIGHT YEARS of pension hiking laws were created, whose benefits must be paid.
Even though the pensions in previous, current, and subsequent years were not being properly funded.

Here are the Governors who presided over the scheme.

Pat Quinn, Rod Blagojevich, George Ryan, Jim Edgar, James Thompson, Dan Walker, and Richard Ogilvie.

Here are the Speakers of the House who presided over the scheme.

Michael Madigan, Lee Daniels, Arthur Telcser, George Ryan, William Redmond, Robert Blair, and Jack Walker.

Here are the Senate Presidents who presided over the scheme.

John Cullerton, Emil Jones, Pate Philip, Philip Rock, Thomas Hynes, Cecil Partee, William Harris, and Russel Arrington.

And remember, many of the same people above made a mess out of Police and Fire pensions.

Because police and fire pension benefits were also hiked by state law, but the same state laws require them to be locally funded, there is no State of Illinois pension contribution for police and fire pensions.

So when you hear about the $90 Billion unfunded STATE pension liability, that doesn’t include unfunded POLICE and FIRE pensions.

Isn’t that what you want Illinois residents, slot machines in social clubs to pay for pension benefit hikes?

Pension benefit hikes that nobody ever bothered to explain to you?

Over the last forty years how many headlines did you see that read as follows?

“Yet ANOTHER pension benefit hike passed by Springfield!”

You should have been reading that headline for the last FORTY years.

Because in 38 of those forty years, Springfield passed pension benefit hikes.

Some pension roll backs are inevitable, it’s just a matter of how much.

The pensions are unaffordable.

So rather than adding slot machines in social clubs, tell the public what really happened.

Then once the public realizes what happened, roll backs will be easier.

The politicians and unions know that.

Which is why they don’t tell what really happened.

The story hasn’t been told.

Most people have no clue what happened.

Unless you read Bill Zettler’s book, you don’t know what happened.

What I have explained above is the tip of a very deep iceberg.

Jacking up pensions then funding them with gambling expansion is disgraceful.