Last night, the House passed a very strong ethics reform bill. Speaker Deleo, understanding the deep public anger about the scandals of the recent past, made this bill his top early priority. Transportation and pension reform bills will follow over the next few weeks.
Government Reform
children and families, election laws, ethics rules, insider jobs, pensions & benefits, structure and operations, transparency
Embracing change in municipal health insurance
I have decided to co-sponsor a controversial health care cost control bill authored by the Massachusetts Municipal Association.
Health benefit comparisons
Most state and local government full-time workers are entitled to health benefits in Massachusetts with employee contributions often under 20%.
Pension Reform
While the basic structure of the pension system is economically sound, and the fact that the federal social security system has been underfunded is no reason to punish current Masschusetts employees, there are many pension anomalies that annoy taxpayers and merit fixing.
Private sector pension crisis
Problems in the public sector system mirror problems in the social security system.
Social Security in MA — statistics
The average social security retirement in Massachusetts in December 2005 was just over $12,000 per year.