Opinion: Will anyone have to answer for Illinois' population loss?

At the end of last year, the U.S. Census Bureau released its annual report on population estimates for 2021.^[1]

As expected, Illinois' population declined for the 8th consecutive year but, this time, it was the largest population loss in the history of the state. The trend appears to be accelerating by no small margin.

If you're a resident of Illinois, I'd be willing to bet you already knew that. I'd be willing to bet you already knew that because I assume by now, all of you have seen it first hand.

By now, I'm sure you know a family member leaving for parts unknown because they just needed to get away for a little while and try something new. Or known the coworker who was a little too quick to jump at that job transfer. The neighbor whose college student just never really came back home all that much and then their parents, your neighbor, slowly started looking for a place to help the kiddo raise their own family and, well, I'll be damned if they didn't seem really excited about it after the second bottle of wine, wouldn't you agree honey…wait…is that a "For Sale" sign in their front yard? Another neighbor who blamed the weather. The friend who had the vacation home somewhere out there but probably Florida and who slowly began to spend a little more time away from here until they told your group of friends they were thinking about making a change and you began to see them less and less and then, next thing you knew, they were sharing the MLS listing their realtor had posted on Facebook with their house for sale. And, of course, the other who flat out told you they were leaving because they can't take "IT" anymore.

No, you and I don't know each other, dear reader, but I'm willing to bet you have some sort of story similar to those above.

At first, the stats are somewhat difficult to quantify.

To try and simplify it, over the last 8 years, for every 100 Illinoisans every Illinoisan knows, 3-4 people out of that group of 100 are gone. For ease of conversation, let's say those 3-4 people = one family.

As I said, at a glance, that doesn't seem like much, does it? And I don't disagree. It doesn't seem like much.

"Well, it's just one family out of 100 people I know," you might think.

So what? Who cares? The grass is always greener, as they say?

While that last part remains an eternal truth, the question for Illinois becomes, a land area wherein lies some of the best and most fertile soil on the planet, what if no grass grows at all?

Let's look a little more into the numbers to better try and understand the severity.

Going all the way back to the year 2000, the official U.S. Census Bureau data shows that zero States lost population through the 1990s. Following the collapse of the former Soviet Union and the explosion of then-new technologies that would become the modern internet, it was a boom time and opportunity abounded.

Fast forward a decade and, at the end of 2010 and a decade of tumultuous and significant foreign policy decision-making, the official U.S. Census revealed that only one state - Michigan - had officially lost population over the previous 10 years.

Fast forward one more time and, after the Census in 2020, the new paths of in-country migration began to show their wear and Illinois was one of seven states to lose such a significant percentage of their population they lost a congressional seat. Illinois lost a congressional seat along with California, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.

But just how many people has Illinois lost over the last decade?

Have a look for yourself:

In the last 10 years, the state has lost a total of 344,195 residents and, as the significant declines really began around 2014, since then, the State of Illinois has declined by 401,702 residents.

To understand that figure in another way, that's the equivalent population loss of the entire cities of Aurora and Joliet, the second and third largest Illinois cities, respectively. Oh, and we also have to throw in say all of Mount Prospect...combined.

Or, that's the equivalent of everyone in Naperville, Rockford, and Elgin (the state's third, fourth, and fifth largest cities) deciding to leave over the last 8 years. Or it's Peoria, Springfield, Waukegan, and the entire population of Champaign (not including students at the University of Illinois, of course). It's the equivalent of the Chicago neighborhoods of Lakeview, Lincoln Park, Logan Square, Hyde Park, West Town, and Uptown combined and gone. And yes, in case you were wondering, those neighborhoods combine to form an extraordinary outsized portion of the City of Chicago's tax revenue.

I could continue but we're sure you get the idea.

I admit, statistics like population decline are not a perfect indicator of "problems that desperately need to be fixed." There are always extenuating circumstances for reasons why an individual or family may choose to pull up stakes for parts unknown. Work, weather, etc. But to the Illinois politician, "extenuating circumstances" is just another convenient cover for an excuse.

No, population loss doesn’t cover everything, and there are always extenuating circumstances but, when the statistics are as pronounced, obvious, and consistent as they are in Illinois, it is an indicator of a myriad of somethings. Somethings [broad sweeping hand gesture] which almost always boil down to bad political policy as a result of poor political leadership. And, in Illinois, a person joining the exodus could take their pick of the litter.

Still, even the raw numbers may not convince you to do your best Jim Lovell/Tom Hanks impression to say, "Springfield, we have a problem…"

Would the fundamental realities of your always looming pension crisis give you pause? Meaning, would the money that your government has already spent and promised to generations of employees, many of whom are among those who've left this land for the aforementioned greener pastures but who will receive those promises all the same, promises and money spent based on a tax base that is no longer there, cause you to take notice? Would the knowledge that you, yes you, and your family are going to be responsible for paying those bills all the same and that your taxes are only going to continue to go up and up and up while you receive less and less and less of the public services around you that you're supposed to be paying taxes for, cause you to begin to ask any questions of your elected officials at all?

Or will you, too, open whatever realtor app is at your fingertips and, you know, just start to browse and, gosh, I don't know honey, maybe we should see what's out there? Will you, too, take a number and put your name in line at the local U-Haul?

Is anyone responsible? Will anyone be made to answer a question? Will anyone be held to account?

This week, as if miraculously on cue or gosh, I don't know, after the numbers were released, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker began to release his first campaign ads for the upcoming election cycle.

Here's what he and his campaign have to say about the situation:

"We're on the right track…"

Really? Are we, Governor? The numbers above say otherwise but it's not the first time he's said it.

Back in the spring of last year, after Illinois lost the congressional seat, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker told reporters that he was worried about the state’s population loss, but was quick to point to the historic trend that predated his term in office.^[2]

“We’ve got to turn that around,” Pritzker said at the time. “That’s something that, unfortunately, before I became governor, was really, you know, a bit set in at least clay, if not stone. And now we’re working very hard to make sure we’re going in the right direction.”

We'll remind you that JB Pritzker took office on January 14, 2019. He has now been in office for nearly 3 years. As you can see above, since then, the decline has only worsened. In fact, it is under JB Pritzker's watch, that Illinois' population decline appears to be accelerating and by no small margin.

Sure, every political ad lives in an alternate reality but the actual reality Illinoisans live in is the reality in which Governor JB Pritzker can no longer pretend to hide behind decisions that were not made by him. Decisions that, he claims, began long before he had anything to do with it.

But the truth is, the truth that JB Pritzker wants you to conveniently forget, JB Pritzker has been around a while...

Oh look, over there, there's his name on another building. A law school here, a media institution there, another random museum here, there, and anywhere someone with any sort of influence over cultural matters might look into the history of JB Pritzker and his family's influence in Chicago and Illinois, you can find more Pritzker money.

Oh look, there's another Illinois politician he started bankrolling back in 1996. Aw shucks, there he is on FBI wiretap trying to influence Rod Blagojevich and then hiding when the wolves came for Blago and sent him to federal prison for 14 years.

Outside of Mike Bloomberg in New York (who even he is now getting pushed aside), is there any other wealthy politician in America who gets a bigger pass for his history than Governor JB Pritzker?

Governor JB Pritzker is the same man who, along with the various Mike Madigan controlled political organizations, spent much (pun intended) of the last 25 years bankrolling the state's political machine from way up top all the way down to the bottom, and put the state in the precarious and embarrassing position it’s currently in. The same man who, for over 20 years, stood by and watched after Mike Madigan effectively seized the Chicago and Illinois Democrat Party machine's financial power structure, stood by and watched as Madigan and his cronies enriched themselves and their friends at the expense of the taxpayers, and who stood by and watched as that same group spent the last many decades financially crippling the common man in this state so much that short of a complete and total rewrite of the Illinois State constitution and a complete and total refinance and restructuring of Illinois State's debt obligations there is simply no way for that common man to turn to for escape other than…somewhere, anywhere else?

See, JB Pritzker wants you to believe that there was simply nothing he could do before. He wants you to believe he had no ability to influence anything for the last 25 years he's been politically active. Heck, he's just a regular guy like you and me.

I mean, sure, he is one of the wealthiest men in the State of Illinois and from one of the wealthiest families in American history but now and only now that he has the title of Governor can he possibly be able to really get in there and, aw shucks and gee golly, turn this state around.

"You keep your word," he says.

Does he?

Governor JB Pritzker who still, to this day, does everything he can to hide his personal wealth in offshore accounts in Aruba and the Bahamas and who's gone so far as to take his toilets out of one of the many estates he owns to avoid paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in property taxes on and who continues to try and hide behind everything in the room, including the elephant, when anyone with any question about his decision making and poor leadership over the last two years comes from any direction other than the carefully chosen compass point by his press secretary, Jordan Abudayyeh. Governor JB Pritzker who is more than happy to spend long weekends on his million dollar boats and out at restaurants near his palatial estate just over the border in Lake Geneva while he locks you down and masks you up or sends his wife and daughter to live in Florida where they can participate in activities he and his people won't allow you and your family to do here at home. Governor JB Pritzker who is so quick to be a part of the celebrations when there's literally any positive news out of Chicago but is so quick to run and hide and magically can't be found whenever literally any contentious issue arises - for recent example, his convenient COVID disappearing act this week when the Teacher's Union walked out on CPS again and he left Lori Lightfoot and the rest high and dry (and my regular readers know how much I disdain to defend Lori Lightfoot on anything).

The list goes on.

Will it mean tough questions for JB Pritzker on Illinois population loss this last decade?

Of course not. This is Illinois, after all, where mirrors don't exist.

In the interest of fairness, Illinois was not the only state to lose population this time around. In fact, a total of 17 states lost population while 33 states gained population. For more fairness, the Census Bureau said the U.S. population as a whole grew at the lowest percentage growth rate since the nation’s founding in 1776, COVID being the obvious cause and effect.

Still, Illinois' political leaders mind-numbingly refuse to confront the ever-changing trends in the nature of work and the ability of people, especially young professionals in an increasingly tech-focused service economy, to be able to live and work remotely and where they choose. They refuse to accept that they govern one state in a Union of 50 States of which they are in competition with and that they do not have complete and total control over the lives of the people who live in theirs and that those people can and will so choose to make the quick drive or morning flight shorter than the time from brunch to lunch and be in an entirely different environment where they can jump on a work call in their underwear. They refuse to accept life, business life in particular, is different now and the old way just doesn't cut it anymore. They refuse to ask themselves not only why would older generations leave but why are young professionals not choosing Illinois? Why are those aforementioned college kids not coming back home? Why are businesses not choosing Illinois? Why are they choosing states like Texas, Florida, and Arizona, the states with the largest population increases? Why is this state little more than an afterthought to anyone who did not grow up here?

Is it the weather? Maybe. That's a part of it, for sure. What are they going to do to convince people to stay in counter?

The mere beginning of an acknowledgement of the rising violence in and around the Chicago area they refuse to address or intervene with policy? A crackdown on the utter domination of public union centered politics in coordination with working around the clock to rewrite and relitigate how the very nature of the political power structure in this state works to rid it of its cancerous political corruption? A spending freeze to provide some sort of reprieve for the young professional at the dawn of their working lives so they can hope for a decent financial future in which to start their own young family with a better and more secure outlook?

Nah. Give ‘em sports gambling and more casinos. And marijuana stores. Young people love weed, bro! You think they like prostitution? I hear OnlyFans is super hot right now…

I don’t know, those things may attract young professionals. At least, for a time.

But sooner or later, they’re going to grow up. They're going to grow up and have responsibilities. They’re going to start paying taxes. Big boy taxes. Illinois taxes.

The number one reason affecting individual and family decisions to leave the State of Illinois? The number one reason for the population loss and outmigration over the last 8 years?

Taxes. You probably already guessed that, too.

Again, this is no surprise.

Kiplinger, a Washington, D.C.-based publisher of business forecasts and personal finance advice, recently ranked Illinois as the least tax-friendly state for middle-class families in the entire country.^[3] While the report said Illinoisans had among the highest income tax and sales tax, it specifically noted property taxes as the primary driver for its ranking.

So, to review, it's not an unaddressed pension crisis that has been kicked down the road for decades, or rising crime and a hostile environment toward policing and public safety, or historic political corruption of which there's almost no parallel anywhere in the country combined with a hostile political environment toward both big and small business alike, but it's taxes, that remains the final straw for most leaving this state.

Always is, as they say.

Yet there is no end in sight for the Illinois taxpayer. Not from JB Pritzker. Not from Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot or its city council. Not from anyone involved in "the machine” or any of the wannabes.

The Catch-22 of it all is that none of the former can be fixed until the latter is addressed and none of the latter can be properly addressed until the former is fixed.

Problems compound, you see? Snowball. If left alone too long, the problems only grow and gain mass and begin to roll out of control until no one can or no one will have the political determination and discipline to stand in front and stop it. And when the common man looks up the hill and sees no way up other than that which is coming straight for him and when he realizes he can't out run it, the only way for him to go is out. Lateral. Horizontal. Away. In the hope he can escape its path.

Even to places where there may be no green grass, but at least there's no snowballs.

Now, I don't know about you but those numbers above sure look like a snowball to me. And that type of statistical behavior runs the risk of dragging every other problem in along with it and more and more will be desperately looking to get out of the way.

You trust JB Pritzker to do what needs to be done to stand in front of that and stop it?

Keep your Newtonian physics jokes to yourselves...

Now this focused primarily on someone like JB Pritzker because his reelection ad was presently on my mind and he, like all rich kid trust-fund babies, has a particular knack for shirking responsibilities and convincing people he's a good guy when all he does is open his checkbook for them. And I admit I'm particularly hard on JB but he's an elected official and I don't care how many hundreds of millions of dollars he gives to Northwestern.

It's him who wanted and paid for the office. It's him who has spent his adult political life pretending to be on the sidelines when it was the exact opposite.

But the same hard questions needs to be asked by you of your elected officials throughout the state. From the top to the bottom. The same questions can and should be asked of the Pat Brady's and the Tim Schneider's and all those who make behind the scenes political power plays in and around the city of Chicago who continue to hope nobody notices them. Questions that need to be asked continually.

At least, they should. They should if you or other Illinoisans ever want to actually turn the tide and the fortunes of this place.

Who/what/where/when/why/how will they solve these problems? Can they even offer a semblance of an answer or a plan? Don't let them squirm out of answering. Don't let the Jordan Abudayyeh's of their offices dive in front of them.

And if the answers they give you don't pass the muster of simple logic or anything akin to reasonable expectation, ask more questions. In the wild chance that they do, ask more questions. Follow up on what they're doing to implement those solutions.

Because they won't do anything if you don't. They haven't done anything because you don't. Even as these problems have not only festered but grown to barely manageable levels. These problems are not benign, they're malignant, and the question now borders on the philosophical.

Are Illinois' citizens going to treat it or let it die?

The Illinois politician, all politicians, are not your friends because they wear the same political party pin that you do. They wanted the job of politician. The people who live where you live gave them the job. It is not a costume, no matter how many of them treat it as such. They are adults. Make them be adults. Demand they make the tough decisions. Don't let them hide like JB Pritzker hides.

Or don't. After all, your dream home could be in your pocket right now. Found in a free realtor app that's just a tap away while you sit on your couch in your underwear.

Hopefully, the Illinois politician realizes this, too, before it's too late.

It doesn't take much. They can start right now from their palatial homes outside of Illinois where they escape their own rules for thee.

They can even do it while they sit at home on their couch in their underwear. Doing nothing.

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Notes & References