Kane County Reporter

Rep. Dan Ugaste (R-St. Charles) says Illinois can't continue losing more businesses like this.

"It speaks volumes, not only are we losing people but now our biggest companies as well. The Citadel is one of our biggest investment companies and Caterpillar's been here forever, but they've had enough of how we do things. We can't continue like this, it's just not feasible," Ugaste said in an interview.

Billionaire Ken Griffin, formerly the wealthiest Illinois resident, announced that he has moved to Florida, and he's taking hedge fund giant Citadel and Citadel Securities with him, Market Watch reported. "Chicago will continue to be important to the future of Citadel, as many of our colleagues have deep ties to Illinois," Griffin wrote in a letter to employees. "Over the past year, however, many of our Chicago teams have asked to relocate to Miami, New York and our other offices around the world." According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Griffin is among the top 50 wealthiest people in the world.

Ugaste was asked about his view on what is making these companies move out of Illinois. 

"Refusal to address our problems, taxes are too high, pension debt remains unaddressed and we have more regulations that any other state. It’s a combination of different things," Ugaste said.

Ugaste further said that there are ways in which businesses can be retained. "Lower taxes, instead of every time we get an opportunity figuring out ways we can spend more money, addressing the pension debt and stop regulating so much. We are overregulating and it’s costing us." 

Caterpillar announced on June 14 that it is going to shift its headquarters from Deerfield, Illinois, to Irving, Texas, according to a press release. "We believe it's in the best strategic interest of the company to make this move, which supports Caterpillar's strategy for profitable growth as we help our customers build a better, more sustainable world," said Chairman and CEO Jim Umpleby. 

Boeing announced in May that it is transferring its headquarters from Chicago to a suburb of Washington, D.C., NBC 5 reported. "We are excited to build on our foundation here in Northern Virginia," Boeing President and Chief Executive Officer Dave Calhoun said in a statement. "The region makes strategic sense for our global headquarters given its proximity to our customers and stakeholders, and its access to world-class engineering and technical talent."

Chief Executive magazine conducted a survey of around 700 business owners from every state and ranked Illinois 48th overall, meaning it is the third-worst state in the country for business, The Center Square reported. The two other states that have ranked worse than Illinois are New York and California. Texas, Florida, and Tennessee were ranked as the top states for doing business. 

"We're too corrupt. Our taxes are way too high. We have way too many regulations and we have massive debts, and that is plenty of reason enough for companies to not want to locate in Illinois, not to mention the state is shrinking in population so it's not a growth state to put your business in," said Wirepoints president Ted Dabrowski.