MADDOG'S LAIR
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact

The Instapundit channels one of my favorite commentators, Walter Russell Mead, "The Pension Crisis Keeps Getting Worse"

3/14/2016

Comments

 
Instapundit on the Pension Crisis

Here is the Mead article:

The Pension Crisis Keeps Getting Worse

"The $2 trillion public sector pension shortfall created by decades of interest group bullying and political fecklessness is not going away on its own. In fact, according to a recent report from a major consulting firm, it’s getting steadily worse. The Financial Times:

The health of the US public pensions system is deteriorating. The latest figures reveal that retirement plans have less than three-quarters of the assets they need to pay current and future retirees.

… According to Wilshire Consulting, an institutional investment advisory company, state-sponsored pension plans in the US had just 73 per cent of the assets they needed in mid-2015, down from 77 per cent in 2014."

Unsettling, but consistent for our current crop of craptacular politicians.

"At least some state and local governments are taking steps to reform their public pension systems before it’s too late. For others, that moment may have already passed. It’s probably only a matter of time before the most indebted states and localities start going hat-in-hand to the federal government requesting massive bailouts. Time for think tanks, academics, and policymakers to start preparing for this eventuality: Should Congress be prepared to offer any assistance, and if so, on what terms?"

This is not the subject for a federal bailout. The states need to come to Jesus on this issue with their own voters finding responsible solutions. It seems likely that this could be catalyst for great positive change in the public sphere, if it is allowed to work itself out. If the federal government simply offers bailouts, nothing will be learned, except how to petition, hat in hand. If the various states are allowed to experiment with solutions, we are likely to see valuable change. 

Progressives are not ready for the damage this will bring to the tattered remains of progressivism in the US.

"At least some state and local governments are taking steps to reform their public pension systems before it’s too late." 

Two Cheers for Arizona 

". . . [T]he Arizona Capitol Times reports on the State Senate’s recent vote to make it more difficult for localities in Arizona to restrict AirBnB apartment rentals without permission from the state government, part of Ducey’s “pre-emptive strike” on sharing economy regulation. (In his State of the State address in January, Ducey said that “Arizona should be to the sharing economy what Texas is to oil and what Silicon Valley used to be to the tech industry.”)

To be sure, the full slate of pension reforms (which include changes to the cost-of-living index and requiring new employees to create their own retirement accounts) has yet to be fully implemented, and the AirBnB bill has yet to pass the House. But if Arizona does manage to execute these changes successfully, and they yield the kinds of returns Ducey is hoping for, the Grand Canyon State could plausibly offer itself as a model model for how to slay the worst features of blue model governance—in particular, crony capitalist carveouts and budget-busting union payoffs—and pave the way for a social system better adapted to the economic and demographic realities of the new century. We’ll be watching."

Kill the pensions by shifting current workers to a defined contribution plan. Calculate how much each of these worker had vested in the pension system and deposit that amount into their new defined contribution account. Then find a way to live with the existing pensioners. This will not be easy, but the federal government does not need to step in and bail out these states. 

Oh, and you Oregon public pensioners, don't get too comfortable, this specter also comes for you. Plan accordingly.
Comments
comments powered by Disqus

    Author

    Maddog

      Blog Subscription

    Subscribe to Blog

    Categories

    All
    1000-ways-to-die
    Abortion
    Amazon
    America
    Antisemitism
    Anti-semitism
    Bible
    Blogging
    Blue-model
    Book-links
    Booze
    Bus
    Cancer
    Children
    China
    China-ccp
    China-gdp
    China-ghost-cities
    China-ponzi
    Climate-change
    Coast-guardrescue-swimmer
    Cold-war
    Concealed-carry
    Constitution
    Cool-stuff
    Corruption
    Creative-destruction
    Crime
    Crisis-change
    Dead-guy-vote
    Dead-pool
    Death-of-the-pc
    Declaration-of-independence
    Deflation
    Democrat
    Demographic-decline
    Diet
    Earth-hour
    Ecommerce
    E-commerce
    Economic-change
    Economy
    Education
    End-of-history
    Energy
    Environmentalism
    Epa
    Eric-barker
    Europe
    Executive-outcomes
    F35
    Faith
    Family
    Fascists
    Financial-irresponsibility
    Financial-times
    Firearms
    First-world-problems
    Fitness
    Flight-to-security
    Food
    Fourth-turning
    Free-eye-exam
    French
    Funny
    Gdp
    Gdp-usa-vs-britain
    Gdp-usa-vs-germany
    Gdp-usa-vs-sweden
    Generational-theft
    Global-warming
    Government-incompetence
    Government-we-deserve
    Happiness
    Health
    Helicopter-parent
    Hell
    Holocene
    Honor
    Housing-affordability
    I-love-beaver
    Imf
    Immigration
    Independence-day
    Inefficiency
    Inflation
    Innovation
    Intelligence
    Intergenerational-conflict
    International-relations
    Investing
    Iran
    Iraq-war
    Islamic-reformation
    Italian-travel
    Japan
    Jodie-foster-effect
    Kayaking
    Keynesian-economist
    Kurdistan
    Law
    Leave-nato
    Leave-the-un
    Light-rail
    Maddog-story
    Marine
    Marriage
    Media
    Medical-insurance
    Medicine
    Middle-east
    Military
    Military-waste
    Money
    Monopoly
    Nanny-college
    News
    New-seasons
    Nirvana-is-another-name-for-hell
    North-korea
    Nukes
    Obama-doctrine
    Oil
    Oregon
    Organic
    Parenting
    Partition
    Pearl
    Pensions
    Peter-principle
    Police
    Politicians
    Portland
    Portlandia
    Portland-transit
    Predictions
    President-bush
    President-feckless-odither
    President-obama
    Psychology
    Race-huckster
    Rape
    Recession
    Recipe
    Replace-the-un
    Republican
    Research-studies-are-always-wrong
    Reviews
    Russia
    Salafism
    Sanctions
    Science
    Science-versus-faith
    Self-defense
    Self-drive-vehicle
    Sex
    Shale-oil
    Shia
    Sjw
    Sleeper
    Smart-growth
    Socialism
    Sovereignty
    Sport
    Sunni
    Supreme-court
    Syria
    Tax
    Technology
    Terrorism
    The-fed
    The-house-of-saud
    The-last-economic-superpower
    Therapy
    Trade
    Transit
    True-believer
    Tvfilm-review
    Un
    Union
    Urban-planning
    Urinals-of-note
    Venezuela
    Voter-fraud
    Wages
    Wahhabism
    War
    War-crimes
    Weird
    Weird-science
    Welfare
    Whole-foods
    Work



    RSS Feed

​Maddog's Lair is copyright 2016-2018 by Mark Sherman. Please feel free to quote from this site provided you link back to the original article.
Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact