Illinois deserves better than Walker

By comparing two states under the leadership of two different governors, we can see a clear difference.

Having a $3.66 billion budget deficit and an unemployment rate of 9.2 percent, Governor Scott Walker (R) of Wisconsin took the following steps: reduced education spending, shifted health care and pension costs to employees, reduced taxes on the high income households, forced a "right-to-work" agenda, rejected Medicaid expansion offered under the ACA, and the Governor spent political capital attacking unions.

In contrast, Governor Mark Dayton (D) of Minnesota who inherited a $2.6 billion budget deficit and an unemployment rate of 8.3 percent responded to the recession by: increasing state spending on education and job training, increasing tax rates for those making over $250,000, increasing tax rates on corporations, offering the Medicare expansion under the ACA, increasing minimum wage to $9 (8/1/15) followed by $9.50 (8/1/16), and all the while, Governor Dayton worked with both public and private sector unions.

The outcomes were: manufacturing wages are now $600/month higher for workers in Minnesota than in Wisconsin, Wisconsin's unemployment rate as of March was 4.6 percent vs Minnesota's 3.7 percent, Minnesota created more jobs over the past four years than Wisconsin, and lastly, Minnesota has a $1.2 billion surplus while Wisconsin has a budget deficit.

Illinois' Governor Rauner is a clone of Walker. He continues to attack unions, workers ("right-to-work") pensions earned by public workers, and refuses to impose a higher tax rate on those households making more than $250,000 even though the majority of voters voted to impose a tax hike on high income households last fall. When campaigning, he said he was going to bring the same kind of politics to Illinois that Walker brought to Wisconsin. Illinois deserves a lot better.

Joni Lindgren

Elgin