Brad Weisenstein of the Illinois Policy Institute writes about Caterpillar’s move from Illinois to Texas:

The snapshot of Illinois’s issues includes shrinking population (a loss of nearly 114,000 last year), growing taxation (No. 1 burden in the U.S.), unbalanced state budgets (21 deficits in a row), a public-pension monster ($313 billion deficit), and ballooning property taxes that eat up house values (average rates in Illinois are the second-highest in the nation).
It’s no wonder people and corporations are leaving.
But the tragedy is that these are public-policy issues that are relatively easy to fix. There is a lot to gain if state leaders listen to those advocating the well-being of all Illinoisans, rather than continuing their political tradition of sacrificing the state’s future to offer short-term gains to powerful special interests.

Read the whole thing here.