Costly Government-Worker Pensions

                    

In the states and cities of the U.S. the government unions have been able to get costly pensions and fringe benefits, at the expense of taxpayers, terms of which the latter were not fully aware.

                       

When times got bad, taxpayers soon learned government workers were being paid as much as twice they themselves were getting from pensions and benefits. Worse, the payments were unsustainable,

amidst ever-higher taxpayer loads.

                                           

One example why the burden is onerous: teachers who contributed nothing to their pensions retired at age 60, at 65% of pay. And their retirement check increased 3% a year for inflation. Not bad when secure investments earn less than 3% to 4% a year, while such pensions assume earnings as much as 8%.

                       

Yet, little is being done to rectify the problem, owing to government union stone-walling during labor negotiations. (See the Earl J. Weinreb NewsHole® comments and @BusinessNewshole at Twitter.)