Posted on 10/26/2015 8:48:37 AM PDT by MichCapCon
It began as an idea to drive home for regular people the high cost of government pensions. It has become an ongoing project in a growing number of communities.
Five years ago, the taxpayer advocacy group Taxpayers United of America set out to find out how much former government employees are collecting in pension benefits, and publish both the amounts and the names of who’s getting these checks. The group also estimates the lifetime payouts from those pensions.
“It really rings home for the average citizen,” said TUA’s executive director, Rae Ann McNeilly.
“When people can see that this could be their next door neighbor collecting this money while they are still working (and) only dreaming of retirement, it makes them think twice about where their tax dollars are really going,” said McNeilly.
For example, TUA exposed a scheme whereby former Michigan Education Association President Iris Salters would be collecting a total pension payout of $3.8 million. It also broke the news of the payout due Grand Rapids City Attorney Philip Balkema, a total of $3.2 million.
TUA, based in Chicago, Illinois, collects pension data in a number of states, including Michigan, and publishes lists of the highest amounts collected by former school, city, county and state employees.
“It was not easy collecting that data,” said McNeilly. Government bodies were reluctant to release the data, she said, even with laws like Michigan’s Freedom of Information Act that require them to do so. But the group was not deterred.
“What we wanted to show was that government workers are not held to the same standards as private sector workers. Not only do government workers retire about ten years before private employees, they collect checks that increase in value year after year based on cost-of-living increases. The lifetime payouts can be outstanding,” said McNeilly.
TUA wants to maintain the momentum it has gathered by getting more people involved. The organization has sponsored workshops in Oklahoma and Nevada, and will hold its first event in Michigan on Nov. 12, 9:00-10:30 a.m. at the Radisson Hotel in Lansing. Workshop leaders will share best ways to use FOIA and methods of overcoming delays, denials and excessive costs. Pre-sale tickets are $5 until Nov. 9. The cost rises to $10 after that.
The only people who should truly be getting pensions are those who served in the military.
Not even all of them...
I know a Lt. Col. in the Air Force who has a $3 million pension, roughly. She has spent her entire career getting assigned to her home state, FLA, and the DC area, which she loves. Her job? If you get dishonorably discharged from the USAF, she is your automatic advocate, a “court-appointed” shill if you will, and her mission is to get you something bettern than a dishonorable discharge.
I worked harder in one single week of USMC boot camp than this woman has in her entire career, and she’ll be a millionaire on the back of my labor.
Damn, that's deoor career planning. Wish I'd been as smart.
It isn’t difficult to figure out how much the retirement of all these public employees is worth. I assure you, it is much more than most of you will ever have. You are stupidly paying handsome salaries and even more handsome retirement benefits that you will never have.
For a person retiring at 50 it will cost the taxpayer $2,200,000 on the day that person retires to provide them 80% of an ending salary of $100,000. This is common for small screwl superintendents in Oklahoma. If they wait to retire the cost goes down.
It is easy to use retirement planning calculators that are all over the internet. Everybody who has the most dim hope of retirement should know “their number” (I hate that commercial). For each 100,000 in income the cost of retirement for a person living to 90 is shown below. If a person made 1/2 the assumed 100,000 ending salary reduce the cost of retirement by 1/2.
I did this using the Vanguard tool: https://www.calcxml.com/calculators/retirement-calculator?skn=#results
Cost of retirement for a last working year income of 100,000 with a retirement income of 80% of the final working year and for a person living to 90 after retirement.
$2,210,000 50 (cops and firefighters can retire even earlier and the calculator won’t handle that)
$2,018,000 55
$1,806,000 60
$1,572,000 65 (Almost NO public employees work this long)
Why?
I’ll add to this that public employee retirement does not have to be the least bit concerned by any of these problems that we mere mortals deal with. Public employees retirement plans just increase taxes on the rest of use when they get into trouble or run short on cash.
1. Rate of return uncertainty (returns now are almost nothing. Your only practical alternative is the Shock Market)
2. Having to manage your own investments (good luck, the house, the Shock Market, wins)
3. Inflation uncertainty
4. Living too long and outliving your money
5.
Basically because they usually work for substandard pay and give the very best part of their life to do it and notoriously are not able to get a job with their acquired job skills after they get out. They don’t get much coaching on transferable skills and the private sector is downright ignorant of their skills and appear to have a strong bias that believes they are incapable of the transition from command and control to the kinder gentler world of business.
What do you consider "substandard pay"? And how transferable are skills like air traffic controller, forest park ranger, agricultural inspector, and the like? Most government jobs are pretty specialized, and while they may not be as dangerous as a member of the military in time of war the don't pay very well at the entry level. Mid-career pay may be another matter but that's true of the military as well.
You didn’t read the full thread. The question was why do the military deserve a pension.
Other federal employees were not mentioned. It is well documented that they actually are paid much more handsomely than their private sector counterparts.
And you didn't read the original post that I was responding to, where the poster said only military deserved pensions.
I’ve always felt the military should get pensions because they are putting their lives on the line. There is also high risk of injury, even in peace time. Same goes for cops, firemen.
However I do think it should be graded based on whether you were in hazard duty or what not.
A nice retirement is one way you can market to people to get them to risk their lives for you. Though, I’m sure, some do it regardless.
But the MVA dude?, nah.
As another FReeper mentioned, some people join the military to do specialized, safe jobs that only require them to fly a desk. I don't see how such people could qualify. But given the prevalence of brain-injury and hearing loss from explosions and gunfire, Tinnitus from artillery, and from machinery on ships, bum knees on paratroopers, PTSD, exposure to chemicals and radiation (USS Ronald Reagan after Fukashima, for example), etc...I think pretty much anyone who wasn't a lawyer or something qualifies for a pension.ww
The vast majority in the military never see combat. Many never even enter a combat zone.
Add up the entire benefits package of the military. They are not receiving substandard pay in most cases.
The myth lives on though.
You are correct. I would go on to say that in a free society, with a VOLUNTEER military, substandard pay is a flat out impossibility, unless you’re dealing with retards, morons, etc.
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