Nonunion Cook County employees got 8 percent raise last year

The Chicago Sun-Times reports:

At a time when folks are being laid off, losing their homes to foreclosure and paying the highest sales taxes in the country, Cook County employee paychecks are getting fatter.

County workers who were not promoted to higher paying jobs received an average pay increase of about 8 percent between July 2007 and July 2008, an analysis of the county payroll shows.


That's more than triple the 2.5 percent average pay hike workers in Illinois and four surrounding states received between June 2007 and June 2008, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That's also more than double the 3.8 percent cost-of-living pay hike top state officials received in July.