By Dave Dahl/Illinois Radio Network
SPRINGFIELD – If Illinois lawmakers and the governor are thinking of taxing retirement income, they may want to look at the results of an AARP survey.
“Nearly nine in ten Illinoisans, age 50-plus, oppose a proposal to tax retirement income,” Bob Gallo, Illinois state director of AARP said. He said the ramifications can include worsening poverty – and increasing out-migration.
While you’d think Illinois’ lack of such a tax would be a selling point, Gallo said the state’s property taxes more than make up for it.
“If you add taxing retirement income” to the state’s flat income tax, Gallo said. “It adds regressiveness to regressiveness.”
Gallo said the AARP’s Capitol news conference Thursday was not meant to offer solutions; rather, it was to point out the effects of increasing taxes on the oldest Illinoisans.
