Public Pensions, Financial Time Bomb
August 22nd, 2006
An editorial in the New York Times entitled Public Pensions In Trouble says there is a dispute over whether there will be enough money to cover the pensions for 180,000 public employee retirees in New York City in the near future. But one thing the editorial says is clear: “The governor and the State Legislature have been utterly irresponsible in expanding the city’s obligations without providing any money to pay the additional cost.” This wasn’t as a result of “collective bargaining. It was much easier for the unions to do an end run around the system and simply buy the benefits with campaign contributions and political support. “
The editorial accompanies a series on the pension troubles entitled “Costly Promises”. The third installment today is “State Upgrades Pensions and City Gets the Bill”
In the New York Post, columnist Charles Millard cites the pensions as an example of the “hands-in-the-cookie-jar culture” that Albany “has inflicted on the city.”
Another example: “Last week, Gov. Pataki signed legislation that increases the city’s liability for deaths that may have been related to the cleanup of the World Trade Center. The measure, however well-intentioned, will cost the city millions of dollars – but the lawmakers who so generously enacted it offered no funding to go with it.”
Millard’s solution: “It’s time to put a lid on that jar – or make Albany put in as many cookies as it takes out. At the very least, it should acknowledge its largesse publicly – by putting a price tag on every piece of legislation that will impose a new cost. And admitting who – Albany or local governments – will have to pay that cost. “
By Jonathan Mandell on August 22, 2006, 10:18 amIn category: Albany, Electoral Politics, Gotham City, Public Finance | 1 Comment »



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August 22nd, 2006 at 1:57 pm
The level of outrage is insufficient.
Combined with all the debts run up in recent years at the federal, state and local level, and the lower pay scale for new hires in the public and private sector, these pension sweetners are part of an ongoing generational war against the young. The selfishness boggles the mind. When will it stop?