Will Brownsberger’s recent posts and proposed ideas illustrate what a thoughtful legislators does; research, consult, publicly debate and propose. He is one of the good ones. While I would go in the direction of getting the state out of the retirement business, Will is attempting to lead reform that would reshape the pension system and make the burden of new workers less. The system is currently “bankrupt” (significantly unfunded) , grossly unfair relative to the private sector and distorts compensation with a negative effect on skilled labor. Will’s proposals reform a system certainly in need of reform and hopefully he will continue to lead on this issue. An issue that is not going away and one that will get contentious as boomer’s retire and the benefits “owed” are due but not there.
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Jim, how much does its bankruptness depend on the current state of the markets? I’ve heard for years that pensions were underfunded (grrrrr), but I’ve also heard that health of pensions is often reported based only on current conditions, which are usually either too good or too bad to give an accurate long-term prediction.