Great news, Illinois taxpayers! You'll only be paying an extra $10 million a year for the foreseeable future, thanks to historically low interest rates on bonds like those sold Tuesday to pay for $800 million in road and infrastructure projects. That's what happens when you have the worst credit rating in the nation, a dubious honor Illinois now holds. As most semi-conscious taxpayers in Illinois know, we earned our rock-bottom credit rating by failing to do anything about our ever-increasing debt to our five statewide public pension systems, which now consume close to one-fourth of our revenue. "They are paying a penalty, but we're really, really lucky that rates are at all-time historic lows because the penalty doesn't hurt all that much," said Brian Battle, director of trading for Performance Trust Capital Partners.
