Illinois is the top state in the nation in each of the 6 Rs essential to economic growth: Roads, Railroads, Rivers, Runways, Routers (technology) and Research. And we’re smack in the middle of the largest economy in the world. Illinois should be an economic powerhouse. Why isn’t it?
To see the state’s strengths, just look at a highway map. We have a denser network of interstate highways than any other state. Illinois is the nation’s railroad hub, with more than half of the nation’s intermodal traffic passing through Chicagoland. Water? We have it in abundance: rivers, Lake Michigan, aquifers, and rainfall.
Research? Universities such as the University of Chicago, Northwestern University, and the University of Illinois, as well as the national Argonne and Fermilabs, provide an enviable combination that has produced many Nobel Prize winners. Runway? In 2022, the Official Aviation Guide’s Megahub Connectivity Index ranked O’Hare International Airport the most connected airport in the world.
But as a recent Tribune editorial noted, Illinois’ population and job growth has lagged behind the rest of the country and the Midwest for decades.
What oppresses the nation?
• Corruption. According to an anti-corruption report from the University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago is the most corrupt city in the United States and Illinois is third in public corruption per capita. In 2012, I surveyed 70 Illinois economic development officials. They asked about corruption. Three-quarters of respondents said that perceptions of corruption in Illinois have a negative or very negative impact on their efforts to attract business.
• Unfunded liabilities. Conservative think tank Wirepoints reported that Illinois’ state and local government debt and unfunded pension and employee health care liabilities stood at $110,000 per household in 2021. Businesses worry they may have to shoulder the burden of future tax increases to make up for the shortfall.
• Unbalanced tax system. Some things are taxed too high, others not at all. Our property taxes are the second highest in the nation. My friends who live near Iowa cross the Big River for gas that’s 40-50 cents cheaper a gallon. Meanwhile, we don’t tax services very much, which are growing faster than goods. According to Statista, services made up 77% of the country’s gross domestic product in 2021, compared to just 18% for goods.
• High tuition and student loans. In 2000, the Higher Education Research Group gave Illinois’ universities the highest quality and affordability in the nation. But this year, U.S. News & World Report ranked Illinois’ higher education system 38th in the nation for high tuition and student loan burdens. Nearly half of high school graduates who go on to a four-year college do so from out of state, the second-highest rate in the state. Unfortunately, most of the talented students who go from out of state probably never come back.
• Lack of a tradition of entrepreneurship. Once a Rust Belt manufacturing state, Illinois’ tradition was big, slow and safe, rather than agile startups eager for risk and reward.
• Bad business climate. Chief Executive magazine regularly ranks Illinois as one of the worst states in the country for business. Labor unions dominate Illinois’ major political party, the Democratic Party. In 2022, in a show of force, they rammed through a state constitutional amendment that expands collective bargaining rights more than any other state. Business leaders who wanted to locate in Illinois will tell you they’ve been dealt a nasty surprise.
• Bad reputation. A major survey conducted by Public Policy Polling in 2011 and 2012 asked thousands of Americans about their favorable and unfavorable views of their state. Illinois was one of the few states where unfavorable views outnumbered favorable ones.
• Lack of long-term thinking. Illinois has never comprehensively looked to the future. Why? Our political culture is focused solely on the short-term game: the next two-year election cycle.
What should be done? Let’s start with two actions: The Edgar Fellows Program, led by former Governor Jim Edgar, has trained more than 400 aspiring bipartisan leaders in Illinois, many of whom hold key elected office. Some of these leaders should form their own long-term thinking task forces, similar to Texas 2036.
Second, we can restore checks and balances to Illinois politics by eliminating gerrymandering, which has created disproportionate Democratic majorities in the Illinois General Assembly. We can do this by challenging the unconstitutional 2021 redistricting in state court and by passing a voter-initiated constitutional amendment mandating fair map drawing.
Illinois can leverage its great strengths to once again become the economic powerhouse it once was.
Jim Nowlan is a former Illinois state legislator, senior aide to three governors, and campaign manager for moderate Republican senatorial and presidential candidates. He is co-author of Illinois Politics: A Citizen’s Guide to Power, Politics, and Policy (University of Illinois Press, 2024).
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