Not so long ago, there was hope that major pension reform could happen sometime this year, possibly by the end of the spring legislative session. But events are not playing out this year.
Two big topics have consumed the legislature’s attention this spring: expunging a projected $3.2 billion budget shortfall in order to deliver a balanced budget, and addressing a $771 million funding shortfall for the four transit agencies in the Chicago area, including the prospect of merging them.
Unions are taking advantage of the relative inattention to the pension issue by pushing for a change to the state’s Tier 2 pensions — reduced benefits, offered to employees who started work for the state beginning in 2011. There is concern that the pension payments don’t or won’t keep up with Social Security benefits, which would violate federal policy.
Late last year, a group of unions held a Springfield rally under the theme “Undo Tier 2.” The slogan is shorthand for efforts to claw back cost-saving measures and regain the unusually generous benefits that contributed toward Illinois’ worst-in-the-nation pension underfunding.
