Despite $22.7 billion pension shortfall, Chicago Public Schools to add 2,000 employees –

Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner

The fiscal insanity at Chicago Public Schools continues. Officials there plan to hire another 2,000 part-time and full-time workers this coming school year, never mind the district has racked up the biggest pension debt of any school district in the country. Moody’s already puts CPS’ pension shortfall at $22.8 billion, more than any other school district in the country.* More workers mean more salaries and even more pension debts. 

To make matters more insane, those same officials warn the school district could lose up to 100,000 students this coming school year – about 29% of the district total – as a result of the multi-pronged crises facing Chicago. Those student losses would be on top of the 95,000 the district already lost between 2000 and 2021.

It’s madness any way you slice the numbers, making it clear Mayor Lori Lightfoot and city leaders either don’t understand or don’t care about Chicago’s finances.

A March 2019 Moody’s report laid out for Lightfoot just what a mess she was inheriting when she took over as Mayor. That report showed City of Chicago debts consumed more of city revenues than any other major city in the country, by far. About 32% of the city’s budget was consumed by fixed costs including debt repayments, retiree health obligations and pension contributions – and 57 percent when Moody’s added in the additional amounts Chicago should have been contributing to pensions, called the tread water gap, simply to keep its debts from getting larger that year.