Pension Fund Theft

I knew that we had not seen the end game in the theft of public pensions by private interests. They have created the illusion of a problem. The public and pensioners have reacted in fear and now we are presented with the solution. Classic.

Lets start with the supposed problem. We are constantly being told that public pensions are in trouble. A decade ago they were all overfunded across the United States. You heard me right, overfunded. In California it was so bad that the law prohibited the pensions to be more than 120% funded for more than something like three years. As a consequence it didn't matter if they lost money on bad investments. A trade off was made and the politicians convinced pension boards to invest in the community and they also approved paying out more than they had in the past to pensioners. Everybody won.

I expect my readers to fact check me regardless of their position. It is true, the pension funds had more money than they were allowed to. Across the nation a number of municipalities simply increased the amount that people got when they retired. When the stock market crashed, it didn't destroy the pension funds, they were already maxed out. That is why the Government Fiance Officers Association (GFOA) has published documents proving there is no public pension crisis.

I will make it easy. Look at any public pension plan and ask what the total amount is that is expended each year. Then look at the total assets held by the public pension fund is. How come I cannot find any articles which put it that simply? They do not talk expenditures to assets, instead they talk about how much the municipalities have to contribute when in fact, they have skipped payments across the nation and do not have to contribute today the amounts they claim. You do not have to have assets of $300,000 in the bank to afford a annual mortgage payment of $24,000.

The mainstream media makes it sound as if there is not a single competent local government in the United States, not one is said to be solvent. Of course we are being lied to; but, the question for me has been why.

Bloomberg - Life Insurers May Manage Public Pensions Under Hatch Bill.

Currently, CalPers has about $250 billion in investments, assets. It is an astonishing amount of money. This money already exists, it requires no contributions to be at this amount. If CalPers statements are accurate, it puts out about $20 billion a year in payments. Does that sound insolvent to you? And don't forget, each year CalPers is receiving new money from current employees.

Now another simple question. If these funds are in such bad shape, why would any insurance company want to buy them? This is the largest theft in the history of the world. I read that the public pensions have somewhere around $3 Trillion in assets. That is a lot of money. The way you find thieves is by going where the money is because that is where they are going. The bill says that public pensions will be sold by bid. Imagine having your retirement go to the lowest bidder.