By Adam Hartung
April 30, 2014
Economic growth is a great thing
When the economy booms people make more, so they pay more income taxes. The spend more, which generates more sales tax. They upgrade homes and buy bigger homes, which have higher property taxes. But even though they pay more dollars in taxes, people are happy because they have more cash, and often the percent of their income spent overall on taxes is lower.
A virtuous circle where everyone benefits. Growth helps the citizens, and the community prospers.
For the industrial era, this virtuous circle was great for Illinois. Farmlands continued to prosper with bountiful crops, while new manufacturing jobs created higher incomes for those leaving farms. The roadways and airports grew, while income taxes remained almost paltry by national standards. And Illinois could boast some of the country’s best public schools even while property taxes were below national averages. This growth environment kept locals in the state, and attracted people from the plains, other parts of the midwest, south and northeast as well as immigrants from foreign lands. Industrial growth propelled a great environment.
Illinois has a serious growth problem
Last week many people were surprised by a recent Gallup survey showing that Illinois leads the USA in people wanting to leave their home state. A whopping 50% of the population would like to leave. And Illinois was 2nd from the top with percentage of people who have high intent to actually leave (at 19%.) So if those two groups overlap Illinois could lose 10% of its population in short order!