The U.S. Supreme Court has dismissed a lawsuit by California’s public employee retirement system against investment banks that supposedly “duped” them into buying some $700 million of stock. CalPERS, the nation’s largest pension trust fund, could have joined a class-action with others but declined to do so. Then CalPERS missed the three-year statute of…
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Back in 1999, under governor Gray Davis, the State of California boosted pensions and allowed most government employees to retire at the age of 55. This led to a surge of unfunded liabilities, and even Jerry Brown pushed for minor reforms. State employees hired after January 1, 2013, would have to work to…
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As Chriss Street of Breitbart News reports, California Governor Jerry Brown wants a 42 percent increase in the gasoline tax and seeks to hike Californians’ vehicle registration fees by 141 percent. These tax and fee increases are not to fix the state’s terrible roads, build more water storage, which the state desperately needs, or…
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Shortly after signing a contract with general manager Mike Wiley, Sacramento’s Sacramento Regional Transit “slipped into financial duress from which it has yet to recover,” wrote Tony Bizjak of the Sacramento Bee. “The agency has tapped reserve accounts in the last three years to balance its budget, leaving it with virtually no emergency funds…
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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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Long before his latest State of the State address, governor Jerry Brown has been proclaiming that California is back, and as City Journal California associate editor Ben Boychuk notes, there is some ground for optimism. The Golden State has enjoyed impressive job growth over the past three years and this year might overtake Brazil…
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A major statewide pension reform measure will not, as expected, be on the 2016 ballot. That is bad news for California’s working taxpayers. As Lawrence McQuillan notes, California accounts for $550 billion to $750 billion of the nation’s total unfunded pension liabilities. In his research for California Dreaming: Lessons on How to Resolve America’s…
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Politicians talk about spreading the wealth but ruling-class redistribution works best in one direction. Government takes money from the workers and gives gobs of it to government bosses, often on their way out the door. As we noted, when Jim Estep parted company with the northern California city of Lincoln he bagged a separation…
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As Lawrence McQuillan has observed, unfunded pension liabilities have soared to $4.7 trillion nationwide, and California accounts for $550 billion to $750 billion of the total. CalPERS, the Golden State’s biggest public pension fund, has authorized 99 types of special payments that count in pension calculations, but the only one that drew any objection…
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