CHICAGO, Ill. — Illinois Gov. J-B Pritzker has signed legislation tackling a loan to the state’s unemployment trust fund into law.
Pritzker says the $1.8 billion deal will pay off a federal loan Illinois had to take out when so many people were claiming unemployment benefits during the pandemic, and sets the fund on a path to fiscal stability.
“It was just two years ago, that the United States skyrocketed into record unemployment as our economy was flipped on its head. The Illinois Department of Employment Security paid out over $38 billion in federal and state benefits to those who desperately needed help, a kind of emergency the unemployment system was never built to handle,” Pritzker says.
It’s estimated the new law will save taxpayers about $20 million in interest payments that would have been due next fall.
