Years ago, when the U.S. government spent far less money than it does today and currently plans to spend in the future, elected officials created several trust funds as a way to set aside the “extra” money collected for dedicated purposes, so that it could spend the money later when it would actually be…
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Rob Feckner, president of the CalPERS board of administration, has heard stories that all is not well with the massive pension fund, with assets of more than $301 billion. “Nothing could be further from the truth,” writes Feckner in the Sacramento Bee. “Let me tell you why.” Investment returns for fiscal year July 1,…
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Just when you think that the Department of Veterans Affairs might finally be starting to get its act together, along comes yet another example that demonstrates how far out of whack the priorities of its senior leadership and supervisors have been. A joint investigation by Open the Books and WSB-TV News of Atlanta, GA,…
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What should Americans expect to happen when Social Security’s Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) trust fund runs out of money in 2034? For many Americans, including those who are just starting to collect Social Security retirement benefits, that may seem like a long time away. But if current projections hold, well before 2034…
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The Democratic National Convention is going on this week, and much like the Republican National Convention last week, I’m once again planning to avoid watching any part of it. Life is simply too short to waste valuable leisure time on the empty promises of politicians who either won’t keep their grandiose promises or worse,…
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If you’re anything like me, you’re doing everything you can to keep from having to watch any part of the major party political conventions this month. That’s because these kinds of events are far too often long on political hyperbole and short on substance. Too many promises get made that have absolutely no chance…
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We have been tracking Covered California, the Golden State’s wholly-owned subsidiary of Obamacare. Emily Bazar of the Center for Health Reporting has exposed glitches in the system’s $454 million computer system, problems with cancelation of policies when people turn 65, and difficulties in enrollment for others. For Bazar, these and other problems resulted in…
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The Republican National Convention in Cleveland this week has showcased plenty of hoopla and boilerplate rhetoric – some of it apparently plagiarized – but provided little enlightenment on key themes such as education. On Tuesday, House Speaker Paul Ryan and New Jersey governor Chris Christie bypassed the subject completely. Not so Donald Trump Jr.,…
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In 1978, when Jerry Brown was governor, soaring property taxes were literally driving people from their homes. Embattled Californians responded with the People’s Initiative to Limit Property Taxation. This measure capped property tax rates for residential and commercial properties at 1 percent of the assessed value and prevented assessed value from growing more than…
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Each year the Congressional Budget Office publishes its Long Term Budget Outlook, it presents two different scenarios that project the future value of the publicly-held portion of the national debt: the Extended Baseline scenario and the Alternative Fiscal scenario. Because the two have very different assumptions behind them, the question of which scenario is…
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