State and local pension funds face shortfall of trillions
To the mammoth deficit confronting federal entitlement programs, add the gargantuan deficit confronting state and local pension funds. But don’t worry. Your government is cooking the books:
The funds that pay pension and health benefits to police officers, teachers and millions of other public employees across the country are facing a shortfall that could soon run into trillions of dollars.
But the accounting techniques used by state and local governments to balance their pension books disguise the extent of the crisis facing these retirees and the taxpayers who may ultimately be called on to pay the freight, according to a growing number of leading financial analysts.
State governments alone have reported they are already confronting a deficit of at least $750 billion to cover the cost of the retirement benefits they have promised. But that figure likely underestimates the actual shortfall because of the range of methods they use to make their calculations, including practices that have been barred in the private sector for decades.
Some analysts say public employees should brace for a “massive breach of faith.” For when you add these shortfalls to the ordinary care and feeding of the Leviathan, we will soon be unable to pay our bills even if we tax people at 100%.
What’s a polite synonym for “screwed”?