"In a floor speech Monday, House Speaker Jody Richards tried to sound hopeful.
He said "the structural changes we are making will prevent the system from going bankrupt provided that future legislators have the will to fund the system at an actuarially acceptable level as statutorily required by this legislation." Then he added that "investment performance will need to be improved."
All that means if increasingly higher amounts of money are poured into public retirement funds each year, health-care costs don't get too far out of control and investment returns improve, the benefits system may not become insolvent. Insolvency would necessitate putting in even more taxpayer dollars.
Rogers is skeptical about the legislators' plan.
"That's crazy," he said. "That's no reform at all. Uncertainty like that would run my company out of business. Frankly, a well-funded defined contribution plan properly invested can provide much more retirement benefit to an employee than a company pension. There is a reason that virtually the entire private sector has converted to defined contribution plans and the public sector remains mired in the past."
Speaker Richards (or whoever winds up running the House next year) had better get serious about public employee compensation and bringing it more in line with what is available in the private sector.
