Public Sector’s Pension Debate

Last week, Public Sector Inc. hosted a fair, honest debate between Keith Brainard, research director at NASRA, and Jason Richwine, senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation. Their topic was, “Are public pension systems on the road to recovery?”

To this question Messrs. Richwine and Brainard concurred that public pensions are indeed recovering from the Great Recession — and it was the only thing they did agree upon.

Getting Worse Before It Gets Better

The key point, according to the headlines, from the Wilshire Associates’ annual report on state pension funding is that the assets-to-liabilities gap increased 20 percent in 2012.

How GASB Changes Will Affect Public Pensions – Part III

The pending requirements by the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) will require understanding many new terms (some of which are explained in the GASB Part II post; Part I is here). It will also require getting used to several new numbers.

It’s the numbers, Robert P. Schultze, director of the Virginia Retirement System (VRS), says that finally gets people’s attention.

2009 All Over Again

There may be many reasons why some would not want to repeat 2009. One is that 2008 was a particularly bad year for the stock market, and any entity with investments—whether public sector or private, corporation or individual—saw investing earnings plummet.

Using this time-frame, the Pew Center on the States has generated multiple reports that include the word “gap.”  The latest is “A Widening Gap in Cities: Shortfalls in Funding for Pensions and Retiree Health Care,” relying upon data from 2007 to 2010.

Reality Check on Education Pension Spending

PensionDialog welcomes guest contributor Alex Brown, research manager at the National Association of State Retirement Administrators

Some recent publications suggest a crisis in education spending, namely the retirement benefits provided to teachers and educational employees in the United States. For example, according to a report issued by the Hoover Institution’s Koret Task Force on K-12 Education, the most under covered story on American public education is the underfunding of teacher pensions. A recent article expanded on this notion, suggesting that pension costs are draining state education budgets and forcing cuts in other areas where funds could be better spent.