
California Has a Staggering Amount of Pension Debt - HillaryBriss
http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/news/2016/05/11/california-has-a-staggering-amount-of-pension-debt.html
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johnwheeler
When you have CHP officers getting paid $110,000 a year, it's no wonder.

[http://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/search/?q=highway+...](http://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/search/?q=highway+patrol&page=15)

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mywittyname
It's actually a quarter million a year in total benefits.

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zaccus
Can they elect to receive a quarter million cash dollars in lieu of benefits?
If not, such benefits are not really part of their compensation any more than
their uniforms or cars.

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mywittyname
I guess it depends on what constitutes "other pay." There's an officer with
$70,000 worth of Other Pay. But overtime pay is definitely paid in cash.

But if you want to quibble about $70,000 in pension and healthcare payments,
that still leaves $160-180k a year in direct compensation.

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jakozaur
Tons of countries has hidden debt as they retirement is pay as you go system
and at the same time the population is aging.

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nugget
I spent many years as a passionate and vocal fiscal conservative. I stayed up
many late nights arguing for relatively balanced budgets and smart
(generationally fair) budgets. Over time I realized it was likely hopeless,
since words (even the truth) can't compete with the tangible materialism of
bread and circuses; so now I embrace ''Accelerationism''. We will eventually
hit the top of the Laffer Curve, the max debt-to-GDP debt load, and all
related fiscal ceilings and cliffs. Let's just hurry up (and try to spend the
remaining debt space in the best ways possible) and get it over with so we can
have more meaningful debates about how to structure society.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism)

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cylinder
You're overly US-centric I think. The US can run unaccountable deficits due to
reserve currency status, huge capital availability etc. There are still
advanced countries which are fiscally conservative.

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nshelly
It's also difficult to compare US states -- which can't print money, with the
U.S. debt level (relatively acceptable in the developed world). Perhaps a
better comparison is Illinois and California (the highest poverty rate in the
nation, when taking into account cost of living) with eurozone countries like
Italy and Greece, which cannot devalue their currency to remain competitive.
Yet, unlike the Eurozone, there will be more significant federal distributions
to these states which racked up debt and receiving more federal aid including
Medicaid / ACA grants, educational assistance, and food stamps. But we will
continue to experience what is happening in parts of Michigan and Illinois,
where states and cities have to make material sacrifices to pay down the debt.

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HillaryBriss
California also makes material sacrifices to pay down the pension debt.
Consider the condition of the roads (especially in Los Angeles) and the budget
problems facing the UC and Cal State University systems.

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mywittyname
Is $77,000 a lot though? It's much less than Alaska's $113,000 and less than
the average of the top 5 states on the list. Accounting for the net-present
value drops the obligation quite a bit, most of these costs will not bear out
for several decades.

I think it's more important to look at the growth of this obligation over
time. Is it going down as more people move to the state? And how is it doing
relative to tax revenues?

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zlynx
Should add to the California state constitution that whenever there is a
budget shortfall directly related to a thing they voted for, they or their
estate including portions already inherited has to pay for it, up to the
entire value of the estate.

Because the problem is these politicians know that a problem 20 years out is
not their problem and they will never be called to account for their short
sighted decisions.

Unions are equally culpable. Their negotiators and leadership should be under
the same penalties as the politicians. They ask for concessions that can never
be financially stable, essentially guaranteeing that the entire future budget
will have to go to pay for the current union's retirement, screwing their
future members.

