06/01/2017 - Danielle DiMartino Booth: The Demographic Divide: A Police State Of Mind
“It comes down to the demographic divide that’s opened up since President Ford was in office. In the 1970s, the typical public pension’s active employees outnumbered retirees by a factor of four-to-five times; today that ratio is 1.5-to-1 and continues to fall as Boomers retire in droves and Millennials fail to fill the yawning gap.
After a grisly year that ended with a tally of 4,000 homicides, Chicago has begun to coordinate with federal authorities to control a crime wave driven by gangs’ unencumbered access to firearms. The last thing the city can withstand is further cuts to public service funding. By the same token, taxpayers have already begun to vote with their feet as rising taxes and foundering pensions promise to beget more tax hikes to come.
It’s plain that the last thing any of us want to see is a Police State of any kind. But the growing risk is that the next recession and deflating asset prices could well alter the rules of engagement between federal and state authorities on more levels than any of us care to envision.”
