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Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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Just like the mortgage bond crisis, this crisis stems in large part from a lack of transparency. There is no realistic way for the wide variety of stakeholders: – Current and future customers of municipal bonds issued in Illinois (general obligation, pension obligation, working cash, life safety, more) – property taxpayers – income taxpayers – those contributing to the pension system – those receiving a pension to calculate risk of the state and local municipal bonds and the 18 pension funds in the Illinois Pension Code. Of those 18 pension funds, Downstate Police and Downstate fire (all police and fire… Read more »