May 30, 2018

Urban Milwaukee: What’s Wrong with Illinois?

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Although Illinois is widely viewed as a blue state because of its recent record of supporting Democratic presidential candidates, from a “who pays” angle it looks much more like a red state, collecting a much higher proportion of taxes from low earners than high earners. The next chart, based on data developed by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) shows that low-income Illinois residents pay a substantially higher proportion of their income than those with higher incomes, particularly the top 1%.

ITEP has also developed an index of tax inequality, arranging the states (including the District of Columbia) in order of decreasing inequality, puts Illinois as the fifth most unequal in the tax burden, as shown in the plot below. Wisconsin and Minnesota come in at 37th and 45th respectively. Read more



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