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First, I wish nobody who has earned a pension to lose that pension.
However, in the private sector, it has happened again and again. Eastern Airlines pops into my mind.
In the private, it was very common for a large corp to raid its pension fund - borrowing at low interest to fund this or that expansion - and, ultimately, leave the pensioners on shaky ground.
My understanding (and I am not as well-read on this topic as many here) is that it was also a practice to isolate the profitable parts of a business, attach the pension to the not-so-profitable parts, and then scuttle the one with the debt. (I'd welcome a schooling if this is untrue.)
In the private sector, pensioners who got nothing from a company-gone-under received a great big "Too bad" from everyone else. After all, what were they/we to do?
So, now we move to the area of public sector.
That question: "What are they/we to do?" apparently has a different answer. Apparently, the rest of society (connected to the responsibility to pay) should keep paying.
Just as in the private sector, the public sector "raided" the pension funds by diverting funds to other uses. The pension failure was entirely predictable. It wasn't like the pencil pushers woke up one day last year and said, "Oh, look! We're going to have a problem NEXT year!"
Personally, I do not have a problem with the public being held accountable to keep the promises made by THOSE THEY ELECTED... BUT... I'd like to see some consistency at the Federal level if this is how it is going to be done.
One doesn't have to look far to know what I am talking about. Social Security was funded by people for themselves. It is not, nor was ever intended to be, a DOLE.
The Social Security fund was "raided" and the attitude has been, "Too bad."
Just my opinion.
Dave
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