The Incredible Shrinking Illinois: High Taxes And Low Economic Freedom Have Led To State Crisis
by Dean Stansel and Orphe Divounguy via The Daily Caller,
ZeroHedge.com
Wed, 01/24/2018
Illinois has been losing population for four years. The state’s out-migration crisis is so bad that Illinois has dropped from the fifth-largest to the sixth-largest state, falling behind Pennsylvania. Since 2010, the Land of Lincoln lost a whopping 640,000 people on net to out-migration. The state is shrinking so rapidly that it’s at risk of losing a House seat.
Illinois’s people problem is nothing to shrug off, because it indicates the state economy is on pace to continue its decline. And if nothing changes, people will just keep leaving.
So what’s wrong with Illinois?
Terrible economic policies.
Illinois ranks near the bottom in terms of economic freedom compared with the rest of the country, according to the Fraser Institute’s recent Economic Freedom of North America, or EFNA, report, released in partnership with the Illinois Policy Institute. This report ranks states based on an index of 10 variables related to government spending, taxes and labor market freedom. Only 12 states were ranked lower. Unsurprisingly, blue states California and New York ranked at the bottom of the economic freedom list.
Pennsylvania, which just overtook Illinois as the fifth-largest state in the U.S., ranks 18th on the index of economic freedom, compared with Illinois’ 35th place ranking.
The Rest…HERE
