Warning. It’s ugly. It’s a must read by Mike Jonas.
But congratulations to first-year Rep. Jim Arciero. And let’s hope the leadership strengthens their pension reforms to match.
Please share widely!
Commonwealth Unbound looks under the hood on pension reform
Repubs in Senate offered up the amendment to close this loophole for all state workers, saving millions.
It was roll called during pension reform debate with all Dems voting against.
Freshman Dem Rep was not a “lonely voice”.
I think that perhaps even in the majority of cases this provision is abused or partly abused, but I don’t like the idea of sending longtime state employees packing because of a change in administration or differences in opinion with new management, etc. I think a case can be made for at least offering people some protection, but how do you make that kind of system without making it ripe for abuse?
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p>Perhaps if our society had more systems of protection such as universal health care and our state allowed people to buy into both their pensions and social security, but neither of those things are true. So I’d like to root out abuse, but I don’t think we should throw out the baby with the bathwater.
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p>Someone with some more expertise, please: how do we both protect dedicated state workers and protect taxpayers from abuse? Surely, there’s some way we can have our cake and eat it too?
Ryan – There are two types of public employees: (1) career civil servants who should be hired on merit and immune from the political process; and (2) policy-makers who are hired by the Governor because they share his or her political agenda.
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p>The Section 10 termination pensions were enacted in another era, before the unionization of today’s public employees, who, by contract, are protected from termination for political reasons. The person behind the counter at the RMV is protected by a union and can only be terminated for just cause. So section 10 terminations are irrelevant for most civil servants. They get used, however, when the employee’s desire for a section 10 retirement, and the employer’s desire to get rid of the employee, combine.
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p>As for the policy-makers, who are hired because of their politics, they should expect to be terminated when a new administration comes in. If you were a political hire of Mitt Romney, and hired to promote his agenda, and you are completely out of tune with the Deval Patrick agenda, shouldn’t you be fired? And should there be a special retirement option available to you because of that? I think not.
The writer’s bias shows very clearly here:
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p>What relevance does the Walsh job have to do with the subject of the article, except to try and paint Deval Patrick as a person who doles out patronage jobs? Sorry, the writer loses credibility with me for that one.
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p>I agree with Ryan — I think that there should be some protection for longtime workers from being fired during an administration change, but abuse does seem to be pretty prevalent too. I definitely agree that this provision should be eliminated for elected officials turned out of office. Maybe the answer is as simple as adding the pension or termination costs to the departmental budget, so that if someone is fired during an administration change, the budget gets reduced for a while. That would probably dissuade managers from doing “wink-wink” terminations.
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p>I think that meaningful pension reform would include raising the age at which most people can collect to at least age 62, maybe even age 67. I can see some exceptions for jobs which are more physical in nature such as police or fire fighters. Pensions are supposed to support someone in retirement, not to allow them the ability to not work while they are in their 40’s.
Jonas had just discussed two former legislators appointed under Weld and Cellucci who cashed in on this benefit. Walsh was elected to the state house in 1989 which means that she too would have been able to take advantage of pension benefits in short order had she been appointed to the $175k position. She may not be in her 40s, but she’s also not at “retirement age” either. Or do you think she would have declined the pension boost?
Are you saying that it is relevant because, had Walsh been appointed to the position, if she was later terminated, she would have been eligible for the termination benefit?
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p>That seems like a pretty big stretch.
What’s he’s saying is her $175K salary for 3 years would significantly boost her pension. Her pension which would be otherwise based on 3-high years of salary which were substantially lower.
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p>3 years at $175K would leave her with a pension at about $115K compared to a pension of $48K.
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p>3 years at $175K yields a lifetime of extra benefits totaling $67K per year.
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p>Same, with say a Town Moderator who has served for 10 years or in some towns, a Library Trustee. Make friends with the governor; get named to a plum position for 3 years at a high salary. Presto! Big pension for life.
I’m saying she would have been “terminated” at some point and she would have gotten an immediate pension of around $60k p.a. Of course, this is despite the fact that her top total salary up to this point has been around $60k, and her average salary over the 20 years is even lower that that.
Depending on her years of service, her pension could well exceed $100K given the $175K salary.
Any reform that doesn’t begin with ‘this reform limits the reliance on defined benefit plans…’ is flawed from the start.
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p>For each and every PERAC ‘loophole’, there will be an advocate to explain why it’s a good and fair rule, designed to protect the employee.
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p>Fail to win relection, then you get a few bucks extra in your retirement-it’s peanuts. 23 and out encourages retirement and room for young employees to move up; it gets rid of the deadwood, and besides, the MBTA plan is fully funded so there’s no extra cost to the taxpayers….
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p>Credit for Library Trustee. Why not? Shouldn’t we encourage people to serve on the local library board. That was B. Bulger’s reasoning with regards to this particular rule.
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p>Any meaningful reform comes down to this, there are only 3 ways to provide for retirement: 1) rely on government 2) rely on your employer 3) rely on yourself.
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p>Well the State of Massachusetts, in this case, the government AND employer broke its promise: Your plan is underfunded and in many cases, badly underfunded. Note that thing ratios are either 2007 or early 2008 and don’t yet have the poor equity performance of late 2008.
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p>The State has promised a pension, has denied its employees Social Security and has failed to put away money to provide for the pension.
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p>True reform has to recognize the failure; address the underfunding and provide a framework such that new employees’ retirement is made more secure.
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p>Which is why defined contribution has to be central to any meaningful real reform. Patrick’s Pension Reform with his ’23 and out’ soundbites is just a political sideshow.
Remove the #more from your URL? Then the link will lead to the top of the article rather than partway in.
Didn’t Rep. Arciero work in the Treasurer’s Office at some time? Looks like he actually learned something there.