Illinois job market stalls, more than 300,00 left looking for work

By Glenn Minnis | The Center Square contributor
The Center Square

(The Center Square) – Illinois Policy Institute’s Josh Bandoch points to Springfield when it comes to the state’s outlier status on jobs, including the area having lost at least 100,000 posts over just the last six months.

New U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows the hard times left upward of 300,000 residents looking for work by the end of 2025, leaving roughly 1.4 workers competing for every job and making Illinois home to the seventh highest such ratio in the country.

“If you don’t focus on having a pro-growth economy and a pro-growth yield code and a pro-growth fiscal structure, then you’re not going grow,” Bandoch told The Center Square. “You’re going to see businesses not grow as much here as they grow elsewhere and you’re going to see that gap widen. You’re going to see other places seem more appealing than Illinois. We can make different choices to create more opportunity, to create more jobs and create more growth.”

With Illinois’ workforce shrinking by nearly 109,000 over a yearlong period ending in December 2025 and the state’s labor force participation rate recently falling to 63.6, Bandoch worries the situation shows few signs of getting better anytime soon.

“Part of what’s driving this is a challenging business environment, especially in Chicago, that’s obviously a big driver of the Illinois economy” Bandoch said. “Businesses in Illinois are just highly regulated. Illinois is the fourth most regulated state and it has more than double the number of regulations on business or individuals in its legal code and it has more than eight times as many as the least regulated state. Over time that just catches up with you, catches up with businesses and individuals who want to create value and open businesses.”

Bandoch points to the state’s lingering outmigration issues and warns even more residents may be primed to leave if the state resists in making some of the kind of wholesale policy changes he feels are called for.