FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 16, 2026
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Civic Federation: [email protected]
Civic Federation Launches Interactive Illinois State Pensions Dashboard
New online tool provides more than 30 years of data to help better understand Illinois' pension systems
CHICAGO — The Civic Federation today announced the launch of its new Illinois State Pensions Dashboard, an interactive online resource that brings together more than three decades of historical data on Illinois’ state-level retirement systems. The dashboard provides policymakers, researchers, and residents with a centralized resource to analyze one of Illinois’ most significant long-term fiscal challenges and better understand the factors driving pension funding over time.
“Illinois’ pension systems are often discussed in broad terms, but understanding what is driving their financial condition requires looking at the underlying data,” said Joe Ferguson, President of the Civic Federation. “This dashboard allows users to examine long-term trends and evaluate funding policies that have shaped Illinois’ pension systems over time.”
The Illinois State Pensions Dashboard includes data for all five State retirement systems:
- Teachers' Retirement System (TRS)
- State Universities Retirement System (SURS)
- State Employees' Retirement System (SERS)
- Judges' Retirement System (JRS)
- General Assembly Retirement System (GARS)
Users will have the ability to analyze historic trends in unfunded liabilities, funded ratios, investment returns, employer contributions, annual benefits, and membership while creating customized visualizations to compare systems over time.
The dashboard also provides expanded analysis of the State’s three largest retirement systems—TRS, SURS and SERS—which account for nearly all of Illinois' unfunded pension liabilities. These features allow users to compare actual investment returns with assumed returns, evaluate employer contributions against actuarially determined contributions, and examine whether annual contributions are sufficient to prevent pension debt from growing.
The dashboard is designed to serve as an educational resource that allows users to move beyond high-level funding metrics and better understand the trends and policy choices shaping Illinois' pension systems. The Civic Federation encourages users to explore the dashboard, review the accompanying glossary and methodology, and provide feedback as the resource continues to evolve.
The Illinois State Pensions Dashboard builds on the Civic Federation's previous Local Government Pensions Dashboard, which provides historical data and key funding metrics for the ten major local government pension funds serving the City of Chicago and Cook County from 1996 through 2024. Together, the two dashboards offer users a comprehensive view of the financial condition and long-term trends affecting Illinois' largest public pension systems.
Visit the Dashboard
The Illinois State Pensions Dashboard is available at: https://civicfed.org/civic-federation-state-pensions-dashboard
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