Governor Calls Again for Workers' Compensation Reforms

Friday, February 2, 2018 | 0

Gov. Bruce Rauner during his State of the State address on Wednesday renewed his call for legislators to enact workers’ compensation reforms, The News Gazette reported.

Gov. Bruce Rauner

“Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, said he was glad to see Rauner mention again that property taxes are too high, that workers’ compensation has to be addressed and that higher education ‘can be an instrument to spur our economic competitiveness in this state,’” the newspaper reported.

Workers’ comp reform was among the governor’s leading priorities on his Turnaround Agenda, which he crafted in 2015 to improve the state’s economic standing. Illinois’ credit rating is one notch above junk status, and the state has a $251 billion unfunded pension obligation.

As of Thursday, Illinois had $8.5 billion in unpaid bills as a result of a two-year budget impasse, down from $14.4 billion last July.

Michael Lucci, the former vice president of policy at the Illinois Policy Institute, a libertarian think tank, is now Rauner’s deputy chief of staff for policy and legislative affairs.

Lucci for years has advocated for reductions in indemnity payments, wage-replacement ratios, a medical fee schedule and the abolition of physician dispensing of opioids to drive down the Midwest’s highest workers’ comp costs.

Illinois is tied with Oklahoma for the nation’s seventh-highest premiums, at $2.23 per $100 of payroll.