
The CalPERS Board voted to refuse California Gov. Jerry Brown’s modest demand to decrease their expected pension investment returns by a tiny 0.2% year, because the impact would have increased pension contribution costs by about $1.2 billion across nearly 800,000 employees–about $125 per month, on average.
by Chriss W. Street22 Nov 2015, 1:00 PM PST0

In a recent Los Angeles Times “Economy Hub” post on public-sector pensions, Michael Hiltzik took a shot at the California Policy Center for analyzing the average pensions of full-career Calpers retirees–those who work at least 30 years–in its pension analyses.
by Ed Ring2 Oct 2015, 4:00 AM PST0

The Democrat controlled California State Assembly just passed a partisan first of its kind bill that orders CalPERS’ and CalSTRS’ pension plans to sell all of their coal investments.
by Chriss W. Street5 Sep 2015, 9:47 AM PST0

The City of San Bernardino has voted to become the first participant to dump CalPERS after the state’s pension plan shocked participants by announcing contribution rates would rise by 61 percent over the next five years.
by Chriss W. Street1 Sep 2015, 5:49 AM PST0

CalPERS, the Golden State’s public employee retirement system, is seeking to shift the cost and risk of pensions to taxpayers after a $5 billion shortfall in 2014.
by Joel B. Pollak30 Aug 2015, 5:33 AM PST0

Each new California legislative session starts with Republicans yakking about cutting state and local public pension benefits that are over $1 trillion underfunded. But as a minority party and with many of its loudest advocates hypocritically receiving a public pension, reform has just been about yakking. But with CalPERS’ actuaries demanding a pension funding increase from $3.7 billion to $7.25 billion by 2020, the state must either cut payroll by 30 percent or find a massive new tax source, like overturning Prop. 13.
by Chriss W. Street1 Aug 2015, 11:51 AM PST0

California’s pension funds moved one step closer to divesting from coal on Wednesday, with an Assembly committee approving SB 185 bill by a 5-1 vote. The bill, which has passed the state Senate, moves to the floor for a vote. It is likely to pass, and Gov.Jerry Brown is likely to sign it into law, though he has opposed measures to ban fracking for oil in the state.
by Joel B. Pollak25 Jun 2015, 6:04 AM PST0

A bipartisan coalition of former and current elected officials, together with fiscal accountability groups, revealed much-anticipated plans Thursday for the newest installment in statewide ballot initiative efforts to combat the crushing burden of public employee pensions in California. The measure is slated to face California voters in November 2016.
by Michelle Moons5 Jun 2015, 4:20 AM PST0

The Port of Los Angeles has been best known for union labor strife over the last year, but the scandal that is blowing up over the arrest of Chief of Port Police Ronald Jerome Boyd on federal bribery, kickback, and tax fraud charges may set a new high for port turmoil.
by Chriss W. Street2 May 2015, 9:00 AM PST0

California government entities and their unions are panicking because Obamacare’s punitive 40% “Cadillac Tax” beginning in 2018 will directly hit the low-deductible and broad-provider network type of “platinum” healthcare coverage that public employees have enjoyed under the California Public Employee Retirement System (CalPERS).
by Chriss W. Street31 Mar 2015, 5:45 AM PST0

San Bernardino, which owed almost $10 million on its pension bond debt ever since it declared bankruptcy in 2012, has defaulted, according to Reuters. Since September, the city has avoided dealing with the bondholders, who have been left out in the cold.
by William Bigelow18 Mar 2015, 5:36 AM PST0

Former San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed is trying to restore fiscal sanity to the state of California by taking on the Goliath CalPERS, America’s largest public pension fund, with a pension reform measure for the November 2016 ballot. Reed is
by William Bigelow12 Mar 2015, 10:48 AM PST0

Investors celebrated the NASDAQ stock market topping the 5,000 level this week for the first time since March 2000. But there were no celebrations in Sacramento for the anniversary of the last time that California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) were over 100 percent funded.
by Chriss W. Street5 Mar 2015, 5:10 AM PST0

The California Public Employee Retirement System (CalPERS) has announced that its solvency has improved and that it is only $89.7 billion underfunded. Unfortunately, CalPERS’s purported solvency of percentage of 77% assumes the fantasy that it can conservatively compound its annual earnings at 7.5% without any losses. But if CalPERS only earns 4.5% a year–a rate conservative private pensions often shoot for–the fund’s long-term liability is a staggering $290 billion.
by Chriss W. Street15 Jan 2015, 4:00 AM PST0

With California facing what Steven Greenhut calls “Death by Pension,” former Democrat Speaker of the California Assembly and newly elected State Senator Bob Hertzberg released details of his Senate Bill 8 tax manifesto. What he refers to as the “Upward
by Chriss W. Street14 Jan 2015, 6:01 AM PST0