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These states are all fiscal wrecks but which one stands on top?
Illinois has a declining population even with Chicago having slight growth. Connecticut is the same way even with its close proximity to New York. Southwest Connecticut known as Fairfield County has Stamford and Norwalk which are the 2 best performing cities in the state in terms of growth. People are leaving pretty much everywhere from Hartford to New Haven. Connecticut had GE and Aetna leave the state, but companies such as Charter Communications have announced over 1,000 jobs in Stamford so there is "some" good news here. New Jersey has a spending problem like Connecticut but over the years A LOT of wealthy taxpayers have left the state, more than Connecticut, I believe. Overall, if you have the RANK these 3 states, which one looks the best in the future?
New Jersey has managed to gain population a little in recent estimates, while Connecticut and Illinois have been declining. This appears to be due to New Jersey receiving a very high rate of immigration from outside the US plus spillover from New York, even as there is a large outflow domestically. New Jersey probably benefits a bit from being in the Philadelphia metro as well, where costs are a bit lower but the location is central within the Northeast megalopolis.
Since Illinois has many less populated rural areas and smaller cities, in addition to containing a major urban core with Chicago rather than being next to a big city elsewhere, it probably has more room for growth in the long run than is true of New Jersey or Connecticut. But the state will need a major fiscal overhaul to get their current issues addressed and its hard to see a path to make that happen. While all three states are at least nominally higher income than most others across the country, they aren't likely to be growth centers for the foreseeable future.
I agree with jas75’s points, and would add that I wouldn’t discount the importance of agriculture to a continuously growing national and international population, and IL is blanketed with fertile land and commodity agriculture, especially compared to NJ or CT.
These states are all fiscal wrecks but which one stands on top?
Illinois has a declining population even with Chicago having slight growth. Connecticut is the same way even with its close proximity to New York. Southwest Connecticut known as Fairfield County has Stamford and Norwalk which are the 2 best performing cities in the state in terms of growth. People are leaving pretty much everywhere from Hartford to New Haven. Connecticut had GE and Aetna leave the state, but companies such as Charter Communications have announced over 1,000 jobs in Stamford so there is "some" good news here. New Jersey has a spending problem like Connecticut but over the years A LOT of wealthy taxpayers have left the state, more than Connecticut, I believe. Overall, if you have the RANK these 3 states, which one looks the best in the future?
1. New Jersey
2. Connecticut
3. Illinois
Switch Connecticut with Illinois. CT is going to continue going downhill, and I don't see it bouncing back. At least Chicago will continue to carry Illinois.
Chicago is in a big flux right now with the more wealthy areas surging at record pace and the west and south side ghetto areas spiraling down. At some point it will stabilize, as long as college educated and a stable population keeps streaming in and downtown is gaining jobs by the thousands things will be ok, but it's a weird time right now for the city.
Illinois outside of Chicago is a mess and I don't see much hope at all. All the upward trajectory is solely in metro Chicago.
NJ's economy has lagged behind other states even in this current good economic state compared to many areas that completely rebounded (while NJ was about the same during the downturn.) So no big gains like in CA, FL, AZ, etc. NJ is too expensive and taxes are insane for corporations to own businesses there, and there is a lot of nepotism in the workplace.
I said IL - in my industry we have sold some insane consulting deals out of our Chicago office. I'm not sure if that's temporary or not, but it's been rather impressive.
NJ's economy has lagged behind other states even in this current good economic state compared to many areas that completely rebounded (while NJ was about the same during the downturn.) So no big gains like in CA, FL, AZ, etc. NJ is too expensive and taxes are insane for corporations to own businesses there, and there is a lot of nepotism in the workplace.
I said IL - in my industry we have sold some insane consulting deals out of our Chicago office. I'm not sure if that's temporary or not, but it's been rather impressive.
Central and north side Chicago vs the rest of the metro area and especially the state is very confusing to try and figure out right now.
The downtown and north side are seeing an unprecedented building boom with thousands of new housing units going up each year and at the moment there are something like 54 highrises under construction. Downtown Chicago has seen more corporate expansion and corporate relocations than any other city in the country. I live on the north side and work downtown and you would think the city is exploding, there are new proposals and buildings started every day. It makes it hard to get around sometimes.
Then you go out and see all the sleepy suburbs not really doing much, the bad issues on the west and south sides and the disaster that the rest of the state has become and it's hard to know where you stand.
If I didn't live where I do in Chicago with such an optimistic outlook and so much activity I would probably try to leave Illinois. As it stands now though I couldn't be happier.
Illinois outside of Chicago is a mess and I don't see much hope at all. All the upward trajectory is solely in metro Chicago.
Which is precisely why Illinois is a mess: it's run by politicians from Chicago who don't know anything about the rest of the state and only support policies that keep jobs going into Chicago, the rest of the state be damned (including trying to suck the remaining larger corporations from downstate). Although some parts of Illinois are doing alright (Bloomington, Champaign, parts of Springfield), the sooner politicians from Chicago, who chiefly run the state, realize a bad Illinois is bad overall for Chicago, the better off both would be. (And make no mistake--not everything is sunshine and lollipops, even in the booming part of Chicago; e.g., the major fiscal crises facing the city in addition to the state)
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