Gov. Prizker to legalize weed to boost budget for education (Chicago: ski resort, home)

[Hiruko]

Originally Posted by dtcbnd03

Exactly. I hope they treat it like tobacco and don't overtax and overregulate it. No need to track it from seed to stem (or bud). A lot of growers in California and Colorado are growing on the black market cause the startup costs are sooooo high.

There are a lot of black market cigarettes in high-tax jurisdictions. Take a trip to New York and see how many people are selling cigarettes on street corners.

[Hiruko]

Originally Posted by aga412

Oh they're massively overspent. Look at CPS, which gets the most funding per student, and they are a total disaster.

I don't know what you mean by 'funding.' Sure, CPS gets more state aid than any of the other school districts in the state. However, CPS does not spend a lot per pupil relative to the rest of the state. The top per-pupil spending public school districts in the state are dominated by the north suburban districts.

[skeddy]

good idea, NY/NJ won't be too far behind.

Colorado cracks a billion in annual marijuana sales in record time, generating $200M in tax revenue.


https://www.denverpost.com/2018/10/1...-sales-record/


Illinois has more than twice the population of Colorado.

[wase4711]

so, what will 200-400 million do to fix a 130 BILLION dollar liability?
plus, people from all over the country have been flocking to Colorado for that reason and many others..Who is going to be anxious to "flock" to Illinois for ANY reason?

Plus, as more and more states make it legal in the next year or two, it will hold little, if any advantage to have legal weed in this state and most others...People WANT to move to Colorade; I dont know many, if ANY who say the same thing about Illinois..

[My Kind Of Town]

Originally Posted by skeddy

good idea, NY/NJ won't be too far behind.

Colorado cracks a billion in annual marijuana sales in record time, generating $200M in tax revenue.


https://www.denverpost.com/2018/10/1...-sales-record/


Illinois has more than twice the population of Colorado.

$200M in only 8 months equates to roughly $300M for the year. Like you said Illinois’ population is more than double Colorado’s. $600-650M in additional tax revenue without a cent coming from my pocket sounds good to me!

[fusillirob1983]

Originally Posted by aga412

Oh they're massively overspent. Look at CPS, which gets the most funding per student, and they are a total disaster.

As someone who has looked at a lot of school district financial statements in prior work, this is not a blanket statement that should be taken from CPS's situation and applied to various suburbs. CPS was underfunded by quite a bit t his past year. Elgin U-46 has been underfunded in the past, but that district increased its net position by almost 10% compared to last year. I've seen a few that ran small deficits, but that was during the worst year of the recession. Pensions are an issue separate from school funding (individual school districts aren't in charge of managing their pension assets), but on an annual basis, most school districts are able to fund their operations properly. It'd be pretty difficult not to or to at least not come close without the superintendent and business manager/finance director/etc losing their jobs (see Lincoln Way, where the guy was committing fraud, which compounded the problem of that district never growing demographically due to the recession's timing). The only reason it would happen otherwise would be due to some unexpected expense that threw them over budget - likely something physical with building operations, transportation, construction or fire and life safety.

Districts literally set their budget based on the expected tax levy, so unless people aren't paying property taxes or some unexpected event occurs, they will be funded properly.

You can argue they spend "too much" per your own opinion, which is arbitrary and therefore property taxes are too high for most people's liking, but that isn't what underfunded means.

As mentioned, pensions are a separate issue that needs to be dealt with. They literally were underfunded, and assets didn't grow as expected either. Part of this is probably due to incorrect actuarial assumptions from the start and in hindsight the plans were never workable.

[madpaddy]

The same shell game that happened with the lottery will happen here. We won't spend appreciably more on schools. We'll end up reducing the amount of money allocated to schools from the general fund by roughly the same amount as the new revenue source adds. Schools will get the roughly same funding, and the legislature will use the general funds they used to allocate to education for other pet programs and projects.

[wase4711]

here's another reason why there wont be any windfall with legal pot in Illinois..

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...al-use-n972786

[OyCrumbler]

It's okay if it's not a massive windfall and not a solve for the hole in the budget. This should be one of many things that the state does and not be expected to be the lone silver bullet but rather one of several steps to put Illinois's finances in order. If done right, this also daylights the industry so the money doesn't need to be put into the black market for perhaps less than stellar things.

[Di3s3l_Pow3r]

Originally Posted by wase4711

so, what will 200-400 million do to fix a 130 BILLION dollar liability?
plus, people from all over the country have been flocking to Colorado for that reason and many others..Who is going to be anxious to "flock" to Illinois for ANY reason?

Plus, as more and more states make it legal in the next year or two, it will hold little, if any advantage to have legal weed in this state and most others...People WANT to move to Colorade; I dont know many, if ANY who say the same thing about Illinois..

For the past few years there was a trend for people to move to states where weed was legal aka. Colorado, Oregon, Washington, etc.

People pretty much went on full band wagon mode....one after another

One fact: Trends change over time

One advantage of Chicago metro over Denver metro is cost of living;
- cheaper houses (can easily find a home under $300K, not so much about Denver)
- better schools
- more jobs with better pay
- world class downtown
- access to water, beach
- no natural threats (fires, shortage of water, etc.)

Yet more people are coming to Chicago than Denver, according to Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/busin...=.866a2f061cf1

Don't get me wrong, I love Colorado for it's natural beauty and world class ski resorts