The cost of corruption in Illinois easily could pay its unpaid bill backlog.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Illinois is one of the 10 most corrupt states in the U.S., especially given the number of politicians in jail and our state’s history of trouble with patronage. A study released in April 2014 revealed that corruption comes with a cost: $1,308 per citizen to be exact. How much is Illinois’ corruption costing you? How does Illinois stack up cost-wise against its corrupt counterparts? See the answers below:
The cost per state was determined using the 2013 census. In case you couldn’t catch the numbers, here they are:
| State | Cost |
| Florida | $25.58 billion |
| Illinois | $16.85 billion |
| Pennsylvania | $16.71 billion |
| Tennessee | $8.50 billion |
| Alabama | $6.32 billion |
| Louisiana | $6.05 billion |
| Kentucky | $5.75 billion |
| Mississippi | $3.91 billion |
| South Dakota | $1.11 billion |
| Alaska | $961.6 million |
Additional figures included in the infographic include the $45 billion Illinois deficit, the $35.7 billion 2015 Illinois budget and the projected $152 million Cook County deficit by the end of 2014.
Leah is a summer intern at Reboot Illinois and is a rising second year student at the University of Chicago majoring in public policy.