The State of Illinois’s backlog of unpaid bills continues to get worse, having passed the $12 billion mark.

Who gets hurt? The people who can least afford it, of course. The state now owes $1 billion to school districts and $775 million to universities — so students get shortchanged.

Another $1.4 billion in health care bills are owed — meaning medical providers and those insured by the state get shortchanged.

State vendors are waiting more than 90 days to get paid — many of them small businesses needing that money to make payroll.

Politicians have gotten the state into this mess, and they are not doing very well to get us out of it. Not paying bills, borrowing money, raiding state employees’ pension funds, taxing the middle class, and not taking the bold steps needed to change Illinois politics are not the way, yet those are the courses our political “leaders” have been following.

Raising taxes on higher income brackets — the graduated income tax that built the American prosperity of the 20th century — is the way. Yet most politicians refuse to consider it.

Incumbents usually win elections, but it is the incumbents who have helped create this mess. We certainly are endorsing some incumbents if we think they will do a better job than their opponents. But we urge voters to take a look at candidates’ economic proposals most closely this year and not to be afraid to vote against those whose economic plans are more gimmick and philosophy than real solutions to the state’s worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Gazette Endorsements:

U.S. Senator
Governor
Lieutenant Governor
State Treasurer
State comptroller
Congressional, State Senators
Cook County Board President
Cook County Sheriff
Cook County Assessor
Cook County Commissioners