Chicago is technically bankrupt. Its expenditures have exceeded its receipts for about ten years. All big rust belt cities in the Midwest, East, and Northeast have been losing population since 1950.
Chicago’s population has fallen to below where it was in 1920. And the number of white people living in the city has declined to below where it was in 1890.
While the wealthiest, those who own businesses, are leaving, the only population growing is Hispanic, and they have a startlingly low education level. The areas of Chicago that are Hispanic are also the areas that have the highest number of households occupied by people with an eighth grade education or less.
Chicago has tried to keep its dying city budget alive with skyrocketing taxes on cigarettes, gasoline, cable TV, phone bills, alcoholic beverages, city stickers, parking. etc When the Cook County Board raised the county sales tax by one percent and announced that 90% of that raise would go only to the pensions of the patronage workers. So even visitors to the city have to support pensioners in Arizona or Florida.
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