Posts Tagged: pension

News

Pension flap imperils transportation funding

Local transportation officials across California are not happy: The feds, weighing in on a public pension dispute, are holding back billions of dollars. That means trains may not run on time, buses may not get bought or fixed and projects may not get built. And that could translate into a lot of unhappy passengers.

News

Backlash feared if pensions fight for funds

The question of whether pensions are “sustainable” may get an answer as a CalPERS board action last week ratchets up annual state and local pension costs during the next seven years.

 

A former CalPERS chief actuary, Ron Seeling, gave pension critics ammunition in 2009 when he said his personal view was that “without a

News

CalPERS panel OKs 50 percent employer rate hike

A CalPERS committee yesterday approved raising employer rates roughly 50 percent over the next seven years, replacing actuarial methods that kept rates low during the recession with a new goal of full funding in 30 years.

 

The actuarial method approved by the benefits committee on a 5-to-2 vote, with some labor unions urging a

News

Hikes in teachers’ pension benefits spurred CalSTRS debt

If not for pension and benefit increases as the stock market boomed more than a decade ago, CalSTRS would be one of the nation’s best-funded large retirement systems with 88 percent of the assets needed to pay promised pensions.

 

Instead, an annual report said last week, the CalSTRS funding level dropped from 69 percent

Opinion

In California, new taxes pay for pensions

What if a corporation raised $500 million in a securities offering on the premise that the proceeds would go for operating expenses, then disclosed a few months later that $300 million of this amount would instead be used to service a debt that wasn’t disclosed in the offering document?

 

This would be false advertising,

News

CalPERS gives tentative okay to 50 percent employer rate hike

The CalPERS board last week tentatively approved an employer rate hike of roughly 50 percent over the next half dozen years, replacing a policy that kept rates low during the recession with a plan to reach full funding in 30 years.

 

While giving unanimous “first reading” approval to the proposal by Chief Actuary Alan

News

LAO: $4.5 billion rate hike for teachers’ pension fund

The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office yesterday recommended that the Legislature adopt a plan to fully fund CalSTRS in 30 years — an estimated cost of $4.5 billion a year, a hefty addition to current annual contributions totaling $5.7 billion.

 

That’s not likely to happen as the state, with a budget back in the black

News

Major move under way to change CalPERS’ board

Assemblyman Marc Levine, D-San Rafael, an upset victor last fall in a new election process, has introduced a bill containing Gov. Brown’s stalled proposal to restructure the CalPERS board, adding financial expertise and loosening labor control.

 

The proposal to change the board, which needs voter approval because of a labor-backed initiative in 1992, would

News

Huge public pension losses could be offset by reforms

A nationwide study, including CalPERS and CalSTRS, projects that huge pension fund losses during the financial crisis will be offset over three decades by a wave of recently enacted cost-cutting reforms — but only if several things happen.

 

–Pension fund earnings forecasts must hit their target. Critics say the forecasts, 7.5 percent a year

News

Yet another fiscal term to learn: the ‘cram down’

A federal judge suggested last week that pension cuts in the Stockton bankruptcy may not be a key issue until the city tries to negotiate a debt-cutting “plan of adjustment” with creditors, a step awaiting an eligibility ruling after a trial later this month.

 

Bond insurers say a city proposal to reduce its long-term

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