During my recent re-election campaign, I made public employee benefit reform a high priority and, having been reappointed to the public service committee, I’ll be working hard on the issue. Ongoing input will be much appreciated.
Government Reform
children and families, election laws, ethics rules, insider jobs, pensions & benefits, structure and operations, transparency
Pension Issues Inventory
Section links are to a proposal for simplification of the pension system (which has been filed as House 2930). House 35 is the Governor’s pension reform proposal. Investment Risk — the possibility that earnings on invested funds will be insufficient to cover costs of future benefits. Many analysts believe that the earnings available to dollar …
Simplified Pension System Proposal
An Act to make the public pension system simpler and fairer, to provide better income security to lower wage state employees and to protect future taxpayers from unanticipated pension costs (HD 01392) Summary: This bill creates a new pension plan for new public employees designed to improve the income security of lower state employees by …
Case Law on Changes to Benefits
In discussing changes to public employee benefits, a critical question is which groups of employees they should be applied to. There is no legal or moral limit to changes for new employees. It would be both illegal and immoral in most instances to make big changes to benefits of those already retired. For the cases …
A “contrary” view on the pension fund problems
Via Brad Delong‘s blog: http://www.cepr.net/index.php/publications/reports/the-origins-and-severity-of-the-public-pension-crisis It argues, roughly, that the current shortfall is attributable to the recent stock market plunge, that pension funds, because of their size and long-term outlook, need not and should not invest like individuals, and that the size of the shortfalls, as a share of future state receipts, is not that alarming. …
Continue reading “A “contrary” view on the pension fund problems”
Move probation to the executive branch?
While the problem of patronage in probation may have been substantially addressed by changing leadership, it still may make sense to reorganize the system.