Matt Paprocki
President
Illinois Policy
Every night, I read my 3-year-old daughter a fairy tale — sometimes over and over — of princesses and dragons, forests and trolls and carriages that turn into pumpkins at midnight.
These timeless stories have the effect of transporting even the most pragmatic of parents away from daily tasks and trials for a moment, as we watch our children become enraptured by their details.
The brilliance of these stories is that they teach foundational principles of character so when we are older, we can pull from these lessons and apply them to our own lives. We learn to be brave, to be strong, to be honest, to be wise. No matter the plot, the story arc is almost always the same: The hero or heroine eventually learns something essential, overcomes the problem and carries forth the lesson we can all apply to various situations.
It struck me that Illinoisans are finding themselves in the midst of a fairy tale right now, one where they have an option to help write their own ending.
While experiencing a worldwide health pandemic and massive societal upheaval with dramatic consequences on our state and local economies, the proponents of a so-called fair tax have spent recent months bombarding the airwaves with fantastical ads promising a whole new world if voters approve a referendum that would abandon Illinois’ current flat-tax protections and give state lawmakers the power to set progressive rates as they see fit.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker, the primary funder of the campaign, has threatened a 20% overall tax hike or a 15% cut to every state function if his measure doesn’t pass. “Where would you cut?” he has asked opponents of the plan. He claims opponents to the plan offer no solutions to address massive structural deficits in the state budget.
It’s the same old false choice — threatened cuts to education, public safety and other essential services — or more tax hikes on people who are already overtaxed. Springfield insiders who have spent decades mismanaging state finances have always insisted there are only these two choices. It’s wrong.
There is a third potential ending to the story. We can say “no” to this newest tax scheme and rescue Illinois by implementing practical structural reforms that would actually fix the problems, and which have been debated at length but ignored.
Instead of taxing people more or cutting the social safety net, we could implement pension reform through a constitutional amendment that preserves workers’ earned benefits, while allowing for changes in unaccrued benefits such as mandatory “cost of living” raises. This would make the system more sustainable, improving retirement security. It would also save the state roughly $2.4 billion the first year and more than $50 billion through 2045.
Also, cutting down on administrative bloat and redundancies in our public education system would allow Illinois to improve education by spending smarter rather than spending more. We spend double the national average on school administration. With government revenues down at the state and local levels, reducing administrative bloat would let Illinois save money and target dollars to students’ educations.
To fully close Pritzker’s projected $6 billion deficit, lawmakers should rely on a combination of zero-based budgeting and outcome-based budgeting. These methods of responsible budgeting have been backed by respected nonpartisan, centrist groups such as the Pew Charitable Trusts, as well as Pritzker’s fellow Democrats. They ensure scarce resources are spent on programs that provide value or return on investment for residents. Illinois should use this data to redirect spending away from inefficient programs and into valuable services that residents need.
The governor should also support and lobby his party in Congress to support the Taxpayer Protection Program, which would give the state access to $3.1 billion in low-interest cash-flow loans, money that has the ability to be turned into grants if common sense reforms are adopted.
There is no enchantress or wizard here, but that’s precisely the point. The hard thing about hard things is that oftentimes there are no easy answers. The real magic is in the honesty, courage and wisdom to confront the problems that lie before us.
“How does it end?” my daughter will ask me as we approach the conclusion of the story.
Voters will tell us on Nov. 3.
