Chicago must hike most homeowners' property taxes by 2.5 % (Union: real estate, 2015)

[Manterro]

Originally Posted by Manterro

My memory is not the best but let me take a shot at this. Recent tax hikes: Huge multi-year property tax, water/sewer/garbage tax increase, soda tax, state income tax increase, another big property tax hike, 2 cell phone tax increases in the last 3 years, a cable tax increase and probably a few more that I missed. I'm giving you all a fair warning. They're going to tax the air you breathe as soon as they figure out a way to do it.

Forgot about the bag tax.

[Manterro]

Last year (May 2016), Moody's advised the City Club that Chicago needs to raise about $1 billion per year over and above whatever the City spends and use that excess tax revenue to reduce its long term debt. Further, Moody's said the City needs to do this for the next 20 years in row. Failure to do means the City's debt pile will continue to grow and an increasing amount of tax dollars will go for debt service instead of operations and new public projects. The Mayor can crow all he wants to about having the lowest deficit in years but having any deficit means the city's debts are still growing and not being reduced. Taxes will have to go up dramatically from present levels. One of these days, I predict the mayor and city council are going to make the recommendation for a city income tax that all residents will pay in addition to the current state income tax. I can see it coming. Democrats love to tax the people and they love to spend other people's money. Reform, cutting the budget and being fiscally responsible is not in their vocabulary.

[Fta23457]

Originally Posted by Manterro

My memory is not the best but let me take a shot at this. Recent tax hikes: Huge multi-year property tax, water/sewer/garbage tax increase, soda tax, state income tax increase, another big property tax hike, 2 cell phone tax increases in the last 3 years, a cable tax increase and probably a few more that I missed. I'm giving you all a fair warning. They're going to tax the air you breathe as soon as they figure out a way to do it.

A cloud tax too for Netflix and other companies.
A rideshare tax for Uber and Lyft too.
Garbage collection fee.
Since Rahm took office Chicagoans are over $2000 poorer. More to come too

[Manterro]

Originally Posted by Fta23457

A cloud tax too for Netflix and other companies.
A rideshare tax for Uber and Lyft too.
Garbage collection fee.
Since Rahm took office Chicagoans are over $2000 poorer. More to come too

Thank you for the update. There's soo many taxes, I can't keep track of them. As far as the money goes, that's $2000 going into the CTU pension blackhole and NOT being spent at local businesses. That really hurts the economy.

[xsboost]

Originally Posted by MarianRavenwood

Considering a move close to home? Indianans and Michigans pay (overall) only about 2% fewer taxes than Illinoisans do (about $100 less per year).

Which table from the link are you basing this statement off of? Is it Table 2: "State-Local Tax Burdens per Capita & as a Percentage of Income"?

[emathias]

Originally Posted by Manterro

...
The Mayor can crow all he wants to about having the lowest deficit in years but having any deficit means the city's debts are still growing and not being reduced.
...

This statement may seem true on its face, but it's not necessarily true. You can run a deficit and be paying down debt, they're not necessarily incompatible. If the deficit you run is lower than the principle you're repaying with debt service, your overall debt will decline.

Furthermore, while this may not be true in this case, in general if you replace debt with lower-interest-rate debt, you're ahead of the game even if your debt isn't in decline.

Finally, if your deficit reflects a budget that is growing at less than the rate of inflation, your debt-to-income ratio can be improving, and your debt to GDP ratio can be improving, both of which brighten the financial picture for ratings agencies such as Moody's.

[Pilot1]

They should move all the Democrat controlled cities (basically all cities) to California, and wall it off!

[lepoisson]

Originally Posted by MarianRavenwood

Option #3: Get involved in politics and change the situation.

But we know that will never happen. Chicago and Illinois have and will always be run by corrupt democrats. The ship could be sinking, but the same people will vote for the same politicians over and over. Getting the idiots to vote for anyone else would be like asking Trump voters to vote Hillary. It ain't gonna happen.

At this point, the best thing to do is just to get the heck out of dodge.

I've already lost $75/mo because of the new income tax rate. When property tax rates increase, my rent will likely increase, meaning my money won't go as far.

[Vlajos]

Originally Posted by Pilot1

They should move all the Democrat controlled cities (basically all cities) to California, and wall it off!

Why, so America can become a third world nation? Without its cities the economy would almost non existent.

[Vlajos]

Originally Posted by Peasy973

Wow. That's bad. That's alot of tax increases in a short amount of time. Years ago, there was talk about LA and California going under due to budget/pension issues. But Gov Brown has really stabilized things since he returned to governor.

Do you guys think that there is a politician in the state who would be governor of Illinois to stabilize things for the state or is too little, too late. I've never lived in Chicago or Illinois for that matter but it would be bad for a city of the size to go downhill.

CA stabilized because of massive tax increases.