The bottom five states in terms of fiscal solvency are Kentucky (#46), Massachusetts (#47), New Jersey (#48), Connecticut (#49), and Illinois (#50).
https://www.mercatus.org/statefiscalrankings
Kentucky is probably the most corrupt state in the south, a distinction usually left to Louisiana.
From the data you provided:
“Illinois’s fiscal crisis is the result of many years of poor financial decisions and budget gimmicks. It is not the result of any one politician or specific administration’s momentary misdirection or misjudgment. The Illinois Policy Institute documents the ongoing and structural nature of Illinois’s poor financial decisions and diagnoses them as a result of THE POLITICAL TENDENCY TO KICK THE CAN DOWN THE ROAD. Even in years in which the state has experienced infusions of revenues, like the one that resulted from the drastic 2011 income tax hike, policymakers end up spending the money irresponsibly. The state has increased pension benefits very generously over the years without making regular payments to keep up with benefit growth. All the while, Illinois residents have been leaving at a much faster rate than residents of any other Midwestern state, and Illinois consistently loses more residents than any other state.”
So at the end of the day, you will have a state full of retirees, with no productive residents to pay them! As I see it, one of these four financial $hit hole states, needs to go under to get everyone else’s attention. And isn’t it “interesting,” that with the possible exception of Kentucky, these states are the one’s who have “exported Socialism” to places like California, Oregon and Washington.