Illinois tax break fail: Sears near death

Closed Chicago Sears store

As I've remarked here a few times, in 2011 Illinois' miserable failure of a governor, Chicago Democrat Pat Quinn, shortly after signing into law a massive income tax hike, signed another piece of legislation giving Sears Holdings, which owns the Kmart and Sears brands, a huge tax break so it wouldn't move its headquarters out of Illinois.

Apparently there soon will be no Sears Holdings and the point will be moot.

Illinois knows how to pick the losers.

From AP:

Sears, once the monolith of American retail, says there is "substantial doubt" that it will be able to keep its doors open.

Company shares, which hit an all-time low last month, tumbled more than 5 percent before the opening bell Wednesday.

Millions of dollars have been funneled through the hedge fund of Chairman and CEO Edward Lampert to keep Sears afloat but with sales fading, it is burning through cash. Lampert combined Sears and Kmart in 2005, about two years after he helped bring Kmart out of bankruptcy

According to a regulatory filing late Tuesday, Sears Holdings Corp. lost more than $2 billion last year. Adjusted for one-time charges, its loss was $887 million.