Illinois Settles SEC Charges Over Pensions [Wow, that was fast....]

CNBC ^ | 3/12/13

[SoFloFreeper]

Illinois, which has the worst-funded state pension system in the United States, agreed on Monday to settle federal civil securities fraud charges alleging it repeatedly misled municipal bond investors about the underfunding of its pensions, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday.

[SoFloFreeper]

Massive fraud in a DEMOCRAT state, and a QUICK settlement....if this were Utah, or Texas, does anyone think Obama's SEC would settle so expeditiously?

[Brad from Tennessee]

[Instead of paying to pension funds what actuaries had determined to be the annual contributions, Illinois followed a funding plan approved by the legislature that deferred the payment of pension obligations, compounding its pension burden.]

I wonder if this opens the state to lawsuits by individual or classes of investors. I don't think sovereign immunity covers purposeful fraud or neglect.

[Rapscallion]

Look closely and sniff: unions did this.

[JohnBovenmyer]

Instead of contributing to future pensions Illinois spent the $ on current expenses. Inevitably most went where most always goes, to personnel costs. They either hired more staff than they would have or paid them more than they would have otherwise. It being Illinois most went to union employees. The unions not only understood what was happening, they were lobbying for it. RICO them along with the political class.

[The Antiyuppie]

That was fast; it got that off of the news wires as quickly as possible. And no one can be fined or thrown in the slammer over it.

[SERKIT]

Nothing to see here, move along, no one’s in trouble, no one’s going to jail....Hey! This is ILL-ANNOY. Wha choo lookin’ at? We’re ALL chumbalones now.

[sr4402]

That was fast; it got that off of the news wires as quickly as possible.

Oh, It was just a slap on the wrist, never mind that the state is going BANKRUPT.

[dznutz]

But we were led to believe it was the employees fault. Some here took the democrats bait and piled on.

[skimbell]

"Instead of contributing to future pensions Illinois spent the $ on current expenses buying votes..."

Fixed.

[JohnBovenmyer]

Fix accepted.

Part of my dream fix for their 'fix' would be RICO. The rest would be to bring those pensions into balance. As their state constitution doesn't allow unilateral canceling of those fraudulent pensions I would instead borrow from the left's playbook and pass a windfall public pension tax on those too rich union and political types. You can do anything if you call it a tax according to the state's best known constitutional expert. Perhaps 40-50% on the average ones and 70-80% on the high end ones would be sufficiently progressive, to be withheld from the pensions by the payors to avoid cheating.