California doubles down on pension debt — and dares Congress to bail it out
On July 1, California’s Assembly Appropriations Committee advanced AB 1383, a bill that guts the pension reform Sacramento passed in 2013 to keep its own promises honest. It would drop the public safety retirement age from 57 to 55, invent a new 3%-at-55 benefit formula, and let cities bargain away the cost-sharing rules that reform required. CalPERS already carries more than $179 billion in unfunded liabilities.
- ▪On July 1, California’s Assembly Appropriations Committee advanced AB 1383, a bill that guts the pension reform Sacramento passed in 2013 to keep its own promises honest.
- ▪It would drop the public safety retirement age from 57 to 55, invent a new 3%-at-55 benefit formula, and let cities bargain away the cost-sharing rules that reform required.
- ▪CalPERS already carries more than $179 billion in unfunded liabilities.
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On July 1, California’s Assembly Appropriations Committee advanced AB 1383, a bill that guts the pension reform Sacramento passed in 2013 to keep its own promises honest. It would drop the public safety retirement age from 57 to 55, invent a new 3%-at-55 benefit formula, and let cities bargain away the cost-sharing rules that reform required. CalPERS already carries more than $179 billion in unfunded liabilities. California’s total state and local pension debt tops $200 billion. Sacramento’s answer, apparently, is to promise more.Congress should not wait to find out how this ends. It should pass a federal fiduciary floor for public pensions now, paired with a permanent statutory bar on any future federal bailout of a plan that fails to meet it.
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