But have no doubt

The progressive left will never see this group of people want to keep more of their own money as “greedy”.

Public school teachers in the city are supposed to save 9 percent of each paycheck in their own retirement account. But for 34 years taxpayers have picked up most of the tab, thanks to a perk in the contract with the Chicago Teachers Union.

In the latest round of contract negotiations, Chicago Public Schools officials reportedly sought to end that practice. Union officials stated they were “highly insulted” by the proposal, deeming it unreasonable because “CPS agreed in 1981 to pay for 7 percent of the 9 percent of each CTU member’s pension contribution in lieu of a raise the board said it couldn’t afford at that time.”

I am certain that raises have been given since which were larger than the 7% the CTU was looking for in 1981. Now would be a good time to set things back right again, no?

Apparently not.

“We note that the state law requiring full funding of annual pension payments beginning in 2016 applies not only to Chicago but to a number of overlapping taxing districts such as Chicago Public Schools, Cook County and a handful of other governmental entities. Without reforms, fully funding pension contributions for Chicago and its overlying taxing districts would require substantial revenue increases and/or expenditure cuts.

“To get a sense of the magnitude of the property tax increases necessary to move to full funding of annual pension payments, Nuveen Asset Management analyzed the 2013 property tax levies, pension payments and Annual Pension Costs (APC) for Chicago and its overlapping taxing districts as reported in their respective audited financial statements. We analyzed the tax bill of a theoretical $400,000 home in Chicago under current tax requirements and a scenario under which the city and its overlapping taxing districts all make full annual pension payments. The analysis does not include the impact of any specialized property tax exemptions like the homeowner’s exemption or the senior freeze exemption. All tax figures are from each entity’s 2013 fiscal year – the most recent fiscal year in common for all issuers.

“Based on our review of each government’s fiscal 2013 audited financial statements, the owner of a $400,000 home would have paid approximately $6,873 in property taxes. As was the case for Chicago, most of these government entities didn’t fully fund their pension payments, therefore maintaining property taxes at levels below where they otherwise should be. Chicago would need to increase its portion of the property tax levy 155.6% to make a full pension contribution and Cook County would need to increase its portion of the levy by 60.8%.

“Altogether, the owner of a $400,000 home in Chicago would need to pay $3,355 in additional property taxes to support full annual pension contributions – increasing the tax bill to $10,228 for a single year jump of nearly 49%. While home rule entities in Illinois, including the City of Chicago, are not subject to state imposed property tax caps, some overlapping tax districts such as Chicago Public Schools are limited to an increase of the lesser of 5% or the change in inflation.”

Personally, I hope they do it. I seriously hope they raise property taxes in Chicago by 50% in one fell swoop. Watch the exodus.

It would give the pundits something actually interesting to talk about instead of the weak sauce I’ve been waking up to lately.

And again, even if the taxes do go up, no one on the progressive left will describe the current or future pensioners of Chicago as “greedy”. Even though that is exactly what they are. Stealing from the tax payer for something they paid very little into. If there were anything resembling actual justice in this world, the city would go back and find the records of payments into the coffers and payments out, figure out what everyone paid into the system, double it and then end payments to that individual or “survivor”.

Getting 200% of what you paid is kind of difficult to whine about in the media, don’t you think? Especially when it can be shown that you’re stealing directly out of a child’s hand to put gas in your Lexus?