Monthly Archives: September 2025

Understanding Illinois’ $187.7 Billion Unfunded Liability

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Illinois faces the highest debt-to-asset ratio of any U.S. state at 468.7%, meaning the state owes nearly $5 for every $1 in assets. The $187.7 billion net unfunded liability represents a structural deficit that requires either massive tax increases, spending cuts, constitutional pension reform, or a combination of all three to address. The delayed financial reporting raises additional concerns about transparency and the actual current state of the finances, which could be worse than these already dire figures suggest.

Total Illinois Government Obligations – Comprehensive Picture

Total State Liabilities: $248.67 billion Total State Assets: $53.05 billion

Net Unfunded Liability: $187.7 billion in unfunded liability

Debt Ratio: 468.7%, the largest in the U.S.

This means every person in Illinois’s 12.7 million population would need to pay $14,780 to eliminate the state’s unfunded obligations.

Breakdown of Major Obligation Categories

1. Pension Unfunded Liabilities: $143.7 billion (as of latest COGFA report)

  • This represents the largest component of the state’s obligations
  • Pension obligations are not constituted of borrowing or financing, but rather are actuarially estimated payments that the State is obligated by law to pay in the future

2. Bonded Debt: $38.1 billion in total outstanding debt

  • Over the past ten years, the State of Illinois has reduced its total amount of outstanding debt by 13.5%, or $5.9 billion, from $44.0 billion to $38.1 billion

3. Major Bond Categories:

  • General Obligation (GO) bonds for capital projects, GO bonds for pension obligations, GO bonds to pay backlogged bills and Build Illinois revenue bonds
  • Pension Obligation Bonds: $8.4 billion in principal and interest is scheduled to be paid by the maturity date of June 2033
  • Bill Payment Bonds: $2.8 billion in principal and interest is scheduled to be paid by the maturity date of November 2029
  • Pension Buyout Bonds: $1.8 billion of $2.0 billion authorized has been issued

Critical Financial Reporting Issue

Severely Delayed Financial Reporting: Illinois still has no ACFR for 2023, a fiscal year that ended over 565 days ago, while states have averaged just 200 days to publish their ACFRs. This means the most current comprehensive audited financial data is over 2.5 years old.

Actionable Financial Impact Details

Annual Debt Service Growth:

  • Current pension contributions: $11.2 billion in FY 2025
  • Projected to grow to $18.5 billion by 2045
  • Governor Pritzker’s FY2026 budget proposal projects a year-over-year reduction in debt from the prior year of approximately $200 million, or 0.5%

New Bond Issuances: The State plans to issue nearly $2.1 billion in new GO bonds to fund capital projects in FY 2026, up from $1.3 billion in FY 2025.

Additional Context – Local Government Debt

The state-level figures above don’t include local government obligations. Historical analysis suggests that when including all state and local retirement obligations, state and local governments in Illinois owe more than $203 billion for pensions and retiree health insurance (though this figure is from 2017 and would be significantly higher today).

Contemporary Misuse of ‘Racism’ in Immigration Discussions

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On the Misapplication of “Racism” in Immigration Discourse

I have concluded that many Americans, particularly in media and political commentary, frequently misapply the term “racism.” At its core, racism involves discriminating against someone based on their race or ethnicity. However, this fundamental definition has become obscured in contemporary political discourse.

The Immigration Law Context

Consider the ongoing debate over unauthorized border crossings from Central and South America. Federal immigration law specifically defines individuals who enter the country without proper documentation as “illegal aliens”—this is the precise legal terminology found in U.S. Code Title 8. When Americans express concern about unauthorized entry and call for enforcement of existing immigration laws, this opposition stems from legal and procedural objections, not racial animus.

Distinguishing Legal Concerns from Racial Discrimination

The key distinction lies in motivation and criteria. Those opposing illegal immigration cite several specific concerns:

  • Legal precedent: Immigration laws exist and should be enforced consistently
  • Process fairness: Legal immigrants who followed proper procedures deserve respect for their compliance
  • Resource allocation: Unauthorized entry can strain public services and infrastructure
  • National sovereignty: Countries have legitimate interests in controlling their borders

These objections would apply regardless of the immigrants’ racial or ethnic background. If unauthorized border crossers were primarily from Canada, Eastern Europe, or any other region, the same legal and procedural concerns would remain valid.

The Consequences of Misapplication

When legitimate policy disagreements are reflexively labeled as racism, several problems emerge:

  1. Definitional erosion: The term loses its precision and impact when applied too broadly
  2. Discourse shutdown: Complex policy discussions get reduced to accusations rather than substantive debate
  3. Actual racism obscured: Real instances of racial discrimination become harder to identify and address
  4. Political weaponization: The racism accusation becomes a tactical tool rather than a meaningful moral category

A More Precise Framework

Rather than defaulting to racism accusations, we might ask more specific questions:

  • Is the objection to unauthorized entry consistent across all ethnic groups?
  • Do the stated concerns focus on legal status rather than racial characteristics?
  • Are similar standards applied to immigration violations regardless of country of origin?
  • Do proposed solutions address legal processes rather than targeting specific ethnic groups?

This framework allows us to distinguish between legitimate policy preferences and actual racial discrimination, preserving the important moral weight that accusations of racism should carry.