They Broke it, We Own it
Via Drudge comes the latest horrific numbers out of state and local pension funds:
State governments from Rhode Island to California have run up estimated pension-fund losses of $865.1 billion, forcing some to cut benefits for new hires.
Assets for 109 state funds declined 37 percent to $1.46 trillion over the 14 months ended Dec. 16, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. […]
After Philadelphia's fund lost $650 million in the first nine months of last year, [Mayor Michael] Nutter joined the mayors of Atlanta and Phoenix in writing a letter to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson seeking financial help for U.S. cities. Their November letter cited investment deficits and rising pension costs.
The $865 billion in losses, which exceed the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program that Congress approved in October, comes as states face budget deficits totaling $42 billion.
Remind me to use the phrase "investment deficits" next time I come home from Vegas. This bailout-begging quote is also rich:
"We can't make enough on investments to drive out of this hole if all you do is depend on investments," said Mike Burnside, executive director of the Kentucky Retirement Systems in Frankfort.
And buried within Bloomberg News' info-packed story is this nugget that every lawmaker should read before agreeing on a federal bailout for local irresponsibility:
Excluding Social Security, public employers' pension costs are three times the retirement costs of their private counterparts, according to a June 2008 report by the Washington- based Employee Benefit Research Institute.
Hmmm, I wonder why that could be? Let's consult Jon Entine's great February cover story, "The Next Catastrophe":
Traditionally, public investments and union-based corporate pension funds were managed according to strict fiduciary principles designed to protect workers and taxpayers. For the most part they invested in safe government securities, such as bonds or U.S. Treasury bills. Professional managers oversaw the funds with little political interference.
But during the last 30 years, state pension funds began playing the market, putting their money into riskier and riskier securities—first stocks, corporate bonds, and foreign investments, then real estate, private equity firms, and hedge funds. Concurrently, baby boomers whose politics were forged in the 1960s and '70s began using those pension funds to advance their social visions. Investments designed for the long-term welfare of retirees began to evolve into a political hammer. Some good occasionally came from the effort, as when companies were pushed to become more accountable in their practices. But advocacy groups often used their clout to direct money into pet social projects with dubious fiduciary prospects. Sometimes the money went to the very companies and financial instruments that, in the wake of the market meltdown, are now widely derided.