'Most of' is a typical righty hyperbole that expresses one wet dream or another that you have no data to back up.

But yeah, don't let the door hit ya in the ass on the way to becoming AL or MS. Hell, southern IL IS KY.

Quote:

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The magnet-like attraction of the Chicago region defies its highly-publicized problems. Data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics show Chicago and its surrounding metro counties are the engine for 9 out of 10 new jobs in Illinois.

It is a trend vividly underscored in recent months when farm and construction equipment giant Caterpillar announced it was moving its headquarters from Downstate Peoria to north suburban Deerfield.

"Chicago politics offends the senses, but the economic activity that surrounds Chicago says that, even if there was an implosion in Cook County, many of those businesses would say, 'Well, we'll just live with it,' " Hicks said. "The most corrupt place in Illinois is probably the most successful economic place in the Midwest."

Despite the narrative about people leaving Chicago and the city being an economic drain, employment in the area reached an all-time high following the Great Recession. Chicagoland accounted for almost 87 percent of the nearly 426,000 private-sector jobs added since the Great Recession. This graphic shows the percentage change in private-sector employment by year in the Chicago area and the rest of the state compared to 2009.


https://infogram.com/_/zAaWSvDwp53uAyiVZzNZ

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