TAXES
Tax Foundation finds Pritzker tax proposal would have devastating effect on Illinois economy. Illinois, which is already one of the highest-taxed states in the nation in terms of sales taxes and local property taxes, would add income taxes to this dismal list of rankings. Under Gov. Pritzker’s proposed Illinois tax rates on individual and corporate income – rates that could be subject to revision – corporate income would be taxed at 10.45%, the third-highest rate among the 50 states. Pass-through business income used by a wide variety of farmers and small businesses would be taxed at 9.45%, the fourth-highest rate for pass-through small-business income among the 50 states.

Illinois state legislators Katherine Hancock Goode, Florence Fifer Bohrer,
Rena Elrod, and Lottie Holman O’Neill pictured in Springfield in 1925.
Photo from the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum.

One hundred years ago, Illinois became the first state in the nation to ratify the 19th Amendment, extending equal voting rights to women. It took another year for 35 more states to follow suit, but the Amendment was eventually ratified in August 1920. It did not take long for a pair of Illinois trailblazers to start on their way to becoming the first women elected to the Illinois General Assembly.

At just over 40, our guest today has already served on the city council of two northern Illinois communities and has been advocating for residents of the Rock River Valley in the Illinois House since 2011.

In our conversation he gives credit to a high school teacher for his interest in the political system and answers questions about a particular suit he wore to Arlington Raceway.

We talk issues under the dome with 69th District State Representative Joe Sosnowski.

TAXES
Gov. Pritzker proposes a $3.4 billion tax hike on Illinois families and businesses. On Thursday, March 7, Governor J.B. Pritzker finally unveiled his plan for a graduated income tax in Illinois. Pritzker’s proposed rates would result in a $3.4 billion tax hike on Illinois families and businesses.

The Governor’s proposal would move Illinois from a flat income tax rate of 4.95% to a graduated income tax with six tax brackets. Families and small businesses with income between $250,000-$500,000 would pay a state tax rate of 7.75%, while the highest rate of 7.95% would apply to all income over $1,000,000. As many small business owners file their tax returns as individuals, Pritzker’s tax hike would hit Illinois small businesses especially hard.

Two members of the National Woman’s Party being arrested
as they picket in front of the White House, 1917

When Dr. Anna Howard Shaw arrived in Springfield in the spring of 1919, her accomplishments in the cause of women’s suffrage were well known. A close friend of Susan B. Anthony, Dr. Shaw had been a leader in the fight for equal voting rights since the late 1880s. Even before then she was a trailblazer, as the first woman to become a minister in the Methodist Protestant Church and a powerful voice for the temperance movement. She also picked up a medical degree along the way.

TAXES
House Republicans File Resolution Opposing Gov. Pritzker’s Unfair Tax. This week,Illinois House Republicans filed House Resolution 153, which states unified opposition to Governor Pritzker’s plan to tax small businesses and middle-class families out of the state through the implementation of a graduated income tax - an “Unfair Tax”.

“Illinoisans cannot afford another income tax increase and we cannot afford a system that allows politicians to play with rates and brackets just to fill budget holes,” said Assistant Republican Leader Avery Bourne. “A graduated income tax will inevitably bring a tax increase on a majority of Illinoisans and will hurt small businesses - making us even less competitive with our surrounding states. I’m proud to stand in opposition to Governor Pritzker’s proposed tax increase.”

Ulysses S. Grant standing alongside his famous war horse,
“Cincinnati” – 1864

When Illinois attained statehood in 1818, it had the smallest population of any state on the day it entered the union – a distinction we still hold today. Most of Illinois was unsettled, and Chicago was just a few cabins around an old fort.

But fifty years after statehood, Illinois’ population had raced beyond one million, we were the nation’s fourth-largest state and Chicago was already its ninth-largest city. In that 50th-birthday year, a second Illinoisan was elected to the White House. It was 150 years ago next week that Ulysses S. Grant of Galena, Illinois, took the oath of office as the 18th President of the United States.