Growing tax burden will push people out of Cook County and Chicago

Illinois Policy ^ | July 15, 2015 | Ted Dabrowski

[george76]

City officials are pushing property-tax hikes, sales-tax hikes, and even a commuter tax and financial-transaction tax.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s wish for a $474 million sales-tax increase to help pay for the county’s growing pension debt has been granted.

The hike pushes the sales-tax rate back up to 10.25 percent in Chicago – the same as it was when Preckwinkle took office in 2010.

And that’s not the only new tax residents have to face. Preckwinkle is just the latest local leader to usher in a tax increase.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel created a new tax earlier this month that taxes Internet cloud services such as Netflix. The mayor has also warned that increased property taxes are on the way to bail out both the city and the Chicago Public Schools.

Chicago Teachers’ Union leader Karen Lewis wants a commuter tax and a financial transaction tax to keep funding the city’s inefficiencies.

Here’s the catch: Taxpayers with the means and flexibility to leave Cook County can avoid the ever-growing tax burden by simply picking up and moving, which is what many have done for 20 years.

According to Internal Revenue Service data, from 1992 to 2011 Cook County suffered a net loss of 370,000 taxpayers to its collar counties and Lake County, Indiana. Those taxpayers took over $18.3 billion in taxable income with them when they left, creating an ever-growing hole in Cook County and Chicago’s budgets.

[napscoordinator]

You know it is.....such BS saying that it was going to be a boon.....yeah right. Of course normal people still put up with it.....oh we complain but that is about it.

[The Antiyuppie]

Laffer Curve Death Spiral. Nothing can stop it, the point of no return was hit some time ago.

[Let's Roll]

I have many cousins in Cook County. They need to leave while they can still sell their houses.

[george76]

A tenured California professor is the latest academic to be accused of re-writing their personal history when claiming Cherokee heritage.

Andrea Smith, an associate professor at the University of California Riverside .. has been called out by critics who say she, like former Harvard Law professor Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D- Mass., and Ward Churchill, a former University of Colorado professor who infamously likened 9/11 victims to Nazis, used the phony claims to enhance her faculty pedigree.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/07/15/california-prof-latest-academic-to-have-claims-indian-heritage-debunked/

[laplata]

Thanks.

[Cboldt]

I have the solution - raise the minimum wage!

[george76]

Churchill was fired for research misconduct, including plagiarism, fabrication, and falsification.

Chickens coming home to roost.

http://www.cuisineillustrated.com/q/Ward_Churchill_academic_misconduct_investigation

[erod]

Some of us are also conservatives who want to get the heck out of dodge. I came to that realization this year.

[cripplecreek]

The fact that Detroit didn’t get a federal bail out scared the hell out of lenders.

[laplata]

Thanks, george76.

[Stosh]

Luckily Chicago’s world-reknowned public school system, well-kept infrastructure - including high-quality street maintenance along with secure and comfortable bus transport - combined with the security of safe and comfortable neighborhoods will be enough of a draw for potential residents to outweigh the minor inconvenience of a few extra bucks in taxes.

[Rodamala]

I hate Illinois Nazis.

[riri]

They are all coming here to Arizona where I am sure they'll repeat the pattern.

They CAN bring the food though.