Longevity hurting CalPERS

by John Seiler | February 7, 2014 2:07 pm

The California Public Employees Retirement System has a new problem: retirees are living longer. That means their pension payouts continue longer than was planned for. Reported AP[1]:

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday urged California’s largest public pension fund to act quickly to address rising costs caused by retirees’ longer life expectancies, saying failure to do so would widen the fund’s liabilities by billions of dollars.

In a letter sent to the board of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, he urged members to acknowledge the demographic changes immediately and phase in the costs over three years rather than waiting two years, as CalPERS’ staff recommends….

The pension fund is $45 billion in the red and will grow by $9 billion because of retirees living longer, the letter said. New projections show the life expectancy of retirees growing as much as two years.

That means taxpayer also are on the hook for the extra money.

But the problem may take care of itself. Before they end up on Medicare at 65, some of these employees will sign up for Obamacare — which has a tendency to kill patients[2].

The public-employee unions that pushed for the pension spiking 15 years ago also were big supporters of Obama, Obamacare and socialized medicine in general. So they have no one to blame but themselves for this problem — and its solution by the grim reaper.

Source URL: https://calwatchdog.com/2014/02/07/longevity-hurting-calpers/

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