The workers paradise of Illinois

From Michael Lucci at Illinois Policy:

ILLINOIS LOSING 1 RESIDENT EVERY 4.6 MINUTES, COULD FALL BEHIND PENNSYLVANIA IN POPULATION
Imagine the entire population of Peoria, Illinois’ seventh-largest city, all picking up and moving across state lines in one year, never to work, pay taxes or create jobs in Illinois again. That’s equivalent to what happened to Illinois over the past year: New migration data from the U.S. Census Bureau show that from July 2015 to July 2016, Illinois lost 114,000 people, on net, to other states, a record high for the Land of Lincoln.

Now consider the permanent loss of the combined populations of Illinois’ 10 largest cities outside of Chicago: Aurora, Rockford, Joliet, Naperville, Springfield, Elgin, Waukegan, Champaign and Arlington Heights, along with Peoria. The loss of these 10 cities’ combined populations approximately equals Illinois’ net loss of population to other states since 2000. Illinois has lost some 1.22 million people, on net, over the past 16 years.

And all of the neighboring states are showing a population increase. One of my favorite metrics for desirability is the cost of renting a U Haul truck each way. I chose a pick-up date of January 15th to eliminate any holliday rate hikes and these numbers are for their standard 10' box truck:

Here is the rate for Chicago to Dallas, TX:

Here is the rate for Dallas, TX to Chicago: 

A little bit over four and a half times more - U Haul has so many trucks leaving Chicago that they have to have employees drive them back to rent again. This is why the rates are so different. You can see the same metric at work comparing San Francisco and Dallas.