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Wish You Had A Pension?
Ashlea Ebeling of Forbes asks, Wish You Had A Pension?:
Traditional pensions have been vanishing for private sector workers, causing untold retirement anxiety, and American workers want them back, according to a survey released today by the National Institute On Retirement Security.
Eight out of ten (81%) of those surveyed say that all workers should have access to a pension plan so they can be self-reliant in retirement. Some 84% say Americans with pensions are more likely than those without to have a secure retirement. And 58% of those without a pension say that a pension would make them feel more confident about their chances of having a secure retirement.
Too bad. Defined benefit pension plans, which provide a monthly annuity payment for life in retirement, are dead in large corporate America. But there is a revived interest in these plans among small business owners (see below).
The survey and an issue brief, “Who Killed the Private Sector DB Plan?,” were released in conjunction with a NIRS retirement policy conference today in Washington, D.C.
“American workers need a pension renaissance,” says Ilana Boivie, an economist and director of programs for NIRS who wrote the issue brief. It addresses the reasons for the sharp decline in private sector defined benefit coverage (increased regulations, fewer unionized jobs), and suggests policy changes that could help reverse the trend (creating third-party sponsorship of defined benefit plans, having employees contribute to the plans, and making pension plans portable).
It’s going to be an uphill battle. In 1975, 88% of private sector workers covered in a workplace retirement plan had defined benefit coverage; by 2005, this number dropped to just 33%, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.
And the number of workers with plans continues to drop – for example, as of Jan. 1, 2011, GE is no longer offering defined benefit plan coverage for new salaried employees. (Instead, these hires will get an automatic annual employer contribution of 3% of their salary to their 401(k)s, in addition to an employer match of up to 4% of salary. They won’t get retiree health benefits either, but that’s another story.)
While the downturn in defined benefit offerings among big employers is drastic, one bright spot the report doesn’t cover is a resurgence in interest in these plans among small employers, typically under 30 employees. Actually, the most generous defined benefit plans are the ones small business folks set up for themselves. “Defined benefit pension plans for small closely held corporations are an extremely powerful way to set aside significant amounts of retirement income in very tax-advantaged way,” says Marcia Wagner, a pension and employee benefits lawyer in Boston.
Who’s a good candidate? Company owners over 50 who want to work another 10 years or so and set aside as much money as possible for themselves and their long-term workers. The catch: you have to have the cash flow to fund the plan.
Wagner recently set up a plan for a small group of neurosurgeons who didn’t feel like their 401(k) plan was going to give them enough money to retire on. The defined benefit plan works in conjunction with the 401(k), not in lieu of it.
How much you can put away is a function of many factors including your age (an actuary calculates all this), but the doctors in their 50s are generally putting away $180,000 each a year for themselves and $15,000 a year for younger staff members on a tax-deferred basis (this does wonders for their income tax liability). After 10 years, they will probably terminate the plan, and have the option of taking slightly under $2 million each (the staff members would get $150,000 each) as a lump sum or a stream of annuity payments over their lifetimes.
“People don’t do DB plans because they think they’re ugly things, but it works very much in the small marketplace,” Wagner says.
For now, if you work in corporate America and have a pension, consider yourself lucky.
Consider yourself lucky if you have any pension at all. But while some are calling for the "death of pensions," I see pensions making a comeback in the future. There will be a political push to find an affordable and practical solution to the ongoing retirement crisis, and I think it's premature to call for the end of DB plans. In fact, smart companies will be looking at ways to attract workers by provided them with a solid DB pension plan.
On this last point, Dean Baker, the economist who predicted the US housing crash long before everyone else, posted a nice piece on Monday, Public Pensions 101:
With the recent spate of attacks on climate science and evolution it should not be a surprise that traditional defined benefit pensions in the public sector are now also under attack. There are powerful political actors in this country who are anxious to build a bridge back to the 19th century; taking us to a time where working people enjoyed few protections and could not count on sharing in the gains of economic growth.
The effort to weaken or destroy public sector unions and take away their pensions is the latest battle in this larger war. As usual, the right has been busy making things up to push its agenda, confident that the media will not expose untrue claims.
At the center of the right’s story is the view that governments are somehow being reckless or irresponsible when they provide guaranteed pensions for their workers. They tell us that these guaranteed benefits will bankrupt state and local governments, imposing impossible burdens on future taxpayers.
This story can be easily shown to be untrue. While the right has been scaring the public with talk of a trillion dollars in unfunded liability in state pensions, this sum can also be expressed as about 0.2 percent of state income over the timeframe in which the liabilities will have to be paid.
In other words, if states raise 20 cents in taxes or cut 20 cents in other spending for every hundred dollars of future income, they will be able to meet their current pension obligations. This is not a trivial sum, but it doesn’t seem likely to bankrupt our youth either.
Furthermore, the vast majority of this shortfall was due to the plunge in the stock market that followed the collapse of the housing bubble. Overly generous pensions were not the problem. The problem here were the greedy Wall Street types who profited from the housing bubble and the incompetent economists who did not see it. Of course the market has recovered much of its losses, so future years’ pension reports are likely to show that most of the shortfall has already been eliminated.
But it is important to understand the basic logic of defined benefit pensions, since many are trying to eliminate them altogether. Defined benefit pensions are in effect a form of insurance. They guarantee workers a level of retirement income based on the years that they work.
This guarantee of future income is more valuable to workers than getting the same amount of money in salary since it would be very expensive for workers to buy the same insurance from the financial industry. From the standpoint of the government, the insurance is virtually costless.
State and local governments will survive into the indefinite future. If the stock market is down any given year or set of years there is little consequence for a government offering a pension fund. Of course, a down market would be devastating for an individual worker if it happens at the point where he/she retires.
This simple logic means that governments can give workers something that is of great value – a guaranteed retirement income – at very little cost. (Research shows that even after adding in pensions, health care and other benefits, public sector workers are paid slightly less than their private sector counterparts.) This means that because governments offer defined benefit pensions they can either attract better workers at the same pay, or the same quality workers at lower pay, than if they did not offer pensions. This is as basic as economics gets.
Not offering pensions would be comparable to a company that had beautiful grounds, with a lake and woods, and then telling workers that they could not use them. Obviously workers would value being able to bring their families to swim at the lake and hike through the woods.
When considering different job opportunities many workers would be willing to forego somewhat higher pay to work at a company that gave them access to such facilities. If there was little cost to the company to make its grounds available, it would just be shooting itself in the foot by closing them to its workers. This is the story with defined benefit pensions; although the issue is far more important since it involves the retirement security of workers and their families.
Most private sector workers formerly enjoyed defined benefit pensions, but these pensions in the private sector are now a fast dying relic. Rather than bring about a downward leveling by eliminating defined benefit pensions for public employees, it makes more sense to take steps to re-establish defined benefit pensions for all workers.
Defined benefit pensions did not create this economic crisis. Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and the other giant banks did. It says a lot about the state of politics that these too-big-to-fail banks seem likely to survive the crisis, while defined benefit pensions may not.
I don't agree with that last point and have discussed my views in an earlier post, The Blame Game. But there is a movement to weaken or eliminate public pensions and it's quite disconcerting. We need reforms but we don't need fear mongering and policies that make no economic sense for the long-term health of our retirement system. On that point, I completely agree with Dean Baker. Millions of people only wish they had a pension. Now is not the time to attack those that have one.
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WISH YOU HAD a PENSION ? You mean, like in the "old days" ? ......... those of us who are old enough do remember the "old days". .......... why my grandma & grandpa retired in what I call "modest dignity" . Modest dignity = they worked all their lives, their homes were purchased on a 15 year mortgage that was PAID OFF in 10 years. Grandpa & Grandma were frugal & put money in a traditional SAVINGS ACCOUNT THAT EARNED INTEREST. & they had a small social security. After Grandpa died, Grandma was still o.k. financially & of course, watched her pennies. When Grandma died, her ADULT CHILDREN received a small inheritance, the house was sold, the savings account split between the adult children & grandma was buried with dignity, because she had saved her money & it was there waiting for her burial............ SOMEWHERE ALONG THE LINE WALL ST. GOT IT INTO THEIR HEADS THAT AMERICANS HAD TOOOOO MUCH WEALTH & THEY WANTED IT FOR THEMSELVES. Now, our elderly are scared are literally laughed at by the biggest criminal of all, BEN BERNANKE . He has thrown them under the freight train ........ Z.I.R.P. for an extended period of time, says he.
The word is LIVID. We should all be LIVID at the systematic destruction of the salt-of-the-earth people in this country. If we do not go into revolution & get rid of the FEDERAL RESERVE BANK we are all toast !! ......... our kids & grandkids are TOAST ! Remember what my Grandma Jo (born in 1915, god rest her soul) said, "Never trust the government & do not go into the stock market."
And back in the day, retirement was like 3 years - then you died - because life-expectancy was so much lower.
I like it.
The people I know with the most lavish lifestyles look forward to big pensions. They don't need to save. They buy vacation homes, take incredible vacations, eat at fancy restaurants, have all the latest cars and appliances, and live a great life. Then there are those of us who have no pensions and live pretty miserable lifestyles so we can save for old age. We buy little fixer uppers, pour in the sweat equity, drive 16 year old clunkers, have 17" televisions, and throw blankets over the holes in our sofas.
Would I like a pension? Hell yes.
Private pension plans usually have no cost of living protection as do government plans. Inflation will eat away at those private plans to where the monthly payment will buy a tank of gas.
Unfortunately for them, that protection is based on CPI, and returned 0% for each of the last two years. So the same is happening to the government pensioners, albeit slightly slower.
The real problem is living for the moment.
This is a societal problem, not just an individual one.
It started with Governments and Corporations making decisions for the short term not long term.
What politician(s) decided that Social Security would be solvent if the money collected was spent on other things?
How many corporations were mis-managed to the point that the pension funds were raided for golden parachutes and "bankruptcy" (United, GM, etc.)?
The other side of the coin is costs; everything is too damn expensive. Profits and upper level salaries are excessive, and there has been a conspicuous shortage of moral adults in positions of leadership for the past, oh, 50 years at least.
The private industry and conservative versus government pay and liberal arguments are red herrings - static in what should be a clear picture. Neither the private sector nor government have been prudent, fiscally conservative, or followed through on promises to their employees.
What built the strength of the nation was a morality and responsibility toward the worker and the promises made. Struggles yes, however, a person could start at the bottom and work their way up and there was loyalty and opportunity. There are many examples but look at professional sports for how the culture and ethos have changed.
When we started to parasitize our industries and workforce by shipping it overseas and head-hunting and takeovers and speculative buyouts and "lay-offs" and "downsizing" and the entire culture of greed was the beginning of the end.
Pension?
Sure, I like the idea, if what I am promised is true 30 years later, if it isn't robbed by the executives, if it isn't milked by politicians, if it isn't pissed away on pork barrel earmarks, if it isn't used for leverage and speculation by the little monsters of Wall Street.
P.S. If their is still a pension when I retire I will get
25% of my current salary. The supplemental medical
I had to bridge me from my retirement to medicare
disappeared with the signing of the health care bill
I work for a major airline and still have a pension.
Other airlines have filed bankruptcy and passed their
pension off to the government to pay it. Companies
learned in the 80's if your pension was over funded
you were taken over and the pension was raided. Now
pensions are funded based on unrealistic return on investment
Catch 22
Why do you think Gordan Gecko loved Blue Star
I would love to offer an defined plan at my small firm - but my competitors won't so they'll have a cost advantage. Unless everybody is in - normal business cycles will crush anyone with a rigid and fixed cost structure. My field is so saturated with competition theres no wiggle room for "the long view". Lastly, unless you can really control what you're gonna get - isn't this just a great way to get more dollars funneled to the banksters. Maybe if physical PM's could be a core holding....but how, really? I mean, how does the bankster come out here?
But, the government is going to give us all pensions - the Guaranteed Savings Account. More vaporware coming soon.
Exempt from Obamacare......Exempt from Private Sector pain.......Exempt from taxpayers giving a shit about them anymore
Some 84% say Americans with pensions are more likely than those without to have a secure retirement.
Nobody who lets other people manage their money is going to have a secure retirement. You "can take that to the bank" as they say.
There will be a political push to find an affordable and practical solution to the ongoing retirement crisis, and I think it's premature to call for the end of DB plans.
The only political push will be to LOOT pension plans, like Obama's "government guaranteed annuity" scam ...(quietly) going through congress as we speak.
The decline in pension participation isn't due to insideous political machinations or widespread corporate greed (though some of the latter surely exists).
As I see it, it's primarily due to far a more boring, mundane reason; most people are unwilling to sacrifice enough income today for a benefit tomorrow.
If you want to retire at a comfortable level, say 50% of final pay, and do it at a reasonable age like 60, it'll cost you about 20% of your income, every year for your whole working life. Most people seem willing to give up only around 5%, a number which might work if the nation's demographics are in your favor (like in America circa 1946 - 1965), but is woefully inadequate under the existing conditions since that time.
I remember back in the 70's and 80's when US corporations were downsizing and eliminating pensions en masse... and the folks who howled the loudest were over 45 or 50... the young were indifferent at best. Not just because the need for a pension seemed impossibly far away, but the current paycheck costs of that pension were rapidly rising to their realistic levels, and the young would rather have the money now. Faced with a choice between a raise now and a DB pension later, they wanted the raise more.
Don't misunderstand... they would have loved the pension too; they were just unwilling to give what it took to actually get it. And that is the story of pretty much all social benefits -- they sound great until the true, continuing costs become apparent.
Your post underlines the impossibility of providing this kind of security on a society wide basis. People will not save 20% of their income. They will not let their companies save 20% of their income for them. If the government forces people to save 20% of their income, a huge pile of money accumulates that the government will not be able to resist spending, as they have spent the SS trust fund.
It worked for the boomers parents because of the odd demographics you point out. The gvt and companies were able to pay the parents out of contributions by the boomers because there are so many boomers. That doesn't work anymore for obvious reasons.
DB were great and was great for me, but are a thing of the past because employers can not afford them any longer and the reason is that private sector must compete in a global economy where our labor costs are excessive.
Talk of productivity gains, innovation etc. is nonsense because technology is instantly mobile across borders. Public compensations and retirement will be under pressure in future as well [Wisconsin] . America is more and more looking like EU, Japan and Libya. Of coarse ,if China and India adopt DB, I could be wrong.
With the recent spate of attacks on climate science and evolution it should not be a surprise that traditional defined benefit pensions in the public sector are now also under attack.
just how is attacking junk science related to pensions?
or is he saying the pension is also a junk idea?
junk the whole article based on that line
and why are we entitled to a secure retirement anyway?
shouldnt your retirement be based on frugality and a vision of the future?
the idea of retirement is a recent idea, it used to be that people were nice to their kids and gave them a reason to care for them in their old age, or they worked
entitlement mentality...the only thing one is entitled to is death
if we werent so damn busy taking care of people who cant or wont take care of themselves, we could take better care of ourselves
and why are shitty politicians entitled to a lifetime of benefits for a few years of service?
they all leave office rich as shit anyway
the whole subject pisses me off to no end
44,retired,no kids, and i was a mechanic
stop living above your means,dont waste your money on crap,invest wisely, and stay the hell out of my pockets
Great statement johnQ
"Now is not the time to attack those that do have one."
I agree, let's not attack those who have a government pension, let's eliminate the pensions and leave the people alone.
We don't even have to do that. Those government pensions will self-destruct when the sponsoring government self-destructs, or they'll be looted down to nothing by Wall Street.
Anyone honestly think Wall Street criminals seeing those tens of billions of dollars just sitting there for the taking, easy pickins, are going to walk away and not go after them?
Surely no one is that stupid / blind / ignorant.
I don't wish I had a pension. I had one until 2002, when I got laid off after 22 years in the telecom sector. It was one of the best things that ever happened because it allowed me to pull out all my pension assets and put them into self-directed IRAs and RRSPs, of which a big portion went into the precious metals sector.
In 2005, I retired. It would never have happened had my pension assets still been under the control of groupthink investment managers. Not to mention that my former employer went bankrupt, leaving the pension plans somewhere around 65% funded after the 2008 downturn.
Self-directed retirement accounts are the way to go. Pension funds are too opaque and run on received wisdom, and most 401(k)s offer a pile of lookalike equity and income funds, with one or two money market funds. Pure excrement.
Who would possibly think that outsourcing manufacturing and walmartizing the US economy would undermine what used to be a sound pension system for those lucky enough to work somewhere where they still have pensions? Duh
If federal, state and county workers want their pensions solvent ... better get that f'ing manufacturing back in this country or ya'll can burn in economic hell with the rest of us in the private sector in this miserable friedmanite economic model. That's all I got to say about it.
I am glad you made the point I was trying to make.
My landlord is a retired california cop and I rent a room from him in his overpriced house that his pension barely covers 1/2 his mortgage payment. My home mortgage is almost 1/3 his, allowing me to move and afford to keep to whereever my job takes me. He was just sucked into what millions have been sucked into. I don't blame him or other federal/state workers, I blame the big bankers and their paid sock puppets in elected office for the disaster they caused.
It is better and more accurate to place blame on the real perps than the victims of their economic/monetary misdeeds. Focus bro, focus on the perps. Peace.
Public sector employees do not produce anything tangible Leo. They provide services based on laws passed by bureaucrats. The suck the life out of the private sector to feed and grow the bureaucracy. They are a group of spoiled children who offer blind allegiance to their master until their master tries to reign in its budget and then they burn, loot, and riot in the name entitlement. People who choose to believe someone else should provide and safe guard for their waining years would rather squander time watching football and drinking beer instead of researching, saving, and diversifying for their, and their children's future.
I know plenty of public sector employees, firemen, who have no retirement savings, a boat, two cars and a $300,000.00 house mortgage all in the name of keeping up with the Joneses. At work their benefits are insane, and have become so used to eating stake and potatoes on the taxpayers dime they grumble at how ungrateful the common folk are because of the irreplaceable services they provide. Cops and teachers are no different. Just like the Government they have forgotten who they work for. The taxpayer is your boss and when you either suck them dry, or they revolt and refuse to pay anymore your last course is to stick a gun at our heads, or call us racists, because some union boss, who is a pig sucking on government money, told you to fight for your Viagra refills, Botox injections, and gender reassignment surgeries because if you concede on one little issue your your whole collective bargaining system will collapse.
I can pretty much guarentee that if people had to fend for themselves they will be able to provide. A prime example is the farce that has become our educational system. There is a home school revolution for a good reason. I can't wait till the government outlaws parents from home schooling their children because it takes a union job away from a teacher.
I know you think you are being an activist Leo, but you are just a Utopian progressive who keeps defending an unfundable dream. People have to provide for themselves, and if you keep taking that responsibility away from them, nothing except stagnation will ensue.. Exactally where we are!
You are exactly WRONG. This is the time to begin the attack on the corruption and excesses of our bloated government. Why should government workers (using the term loosely) be exempt from the pain the rest of us feel.
I have taked some risk in my career, my choices nobody forced me to, and they haven't turned out well. As a result, I make less in nominal terms than I did 10 years ago. My IRA has been significantly depleted due to an extended period of unemployment.
So when I return to work, I should pay higher taxes to fund the lavish salaries, unassailable job security, and generous pensions of government 'workers'? Does this seem right and fair?
Leo can you name one company (mid or large cap) that has gone from DC to DB in the past 10 years?
No, I can't but that doesn't mean that the shift towards DC plans is in the best interest of workers. They are the ones getting screwed over.
A brilliant argument.
No question workers are the losers, which is why companies started converting from DB to DC 20 years ago and that trend accelerated through the nineties, to my amazement companies were able to convert existing employees with suitable notice, though their plan would be red circled at the conversion date. The trend continues today so to suggest that it will reverse is difficult to understand, perhaps if the labor market was tight and unemployment at 3% then maybe companies would have to compete and DB would be part of the basket to attract workers. But even then no one who owns or manages wants to get bogged down with a DB plan, just ask any PE guy.
Leo, DB's are dead, dead, dead. They will not come back. This was always a good idea for workers and a terrible idea for employers.
If you want a DB the growth target will be cut to a more reasonable 4%. When you plug in that number DBs don't make any sense at all.
Bruce,
I respectfully disagree with you. When it comes to pensions, you obviously have no clue about what you're talking about. If you did, you would realize what an incredibly dumb comment that is, the type of nonsense we routinely hear from MSM spreading nothing but lies that pensions are going to drag governments down. At the end of the day, DB plans are much, much better than individual 401(K) or DC plans. Period. They need reforms, but not to be abolished. Employers can make DB plans work, but they've been looting them in good years to pump up their earnings. This is why I prefer a public solution to pensions which pools assets but you have to tighten up the governance. And you need to clean up Wall Street once and for all. That remains the biggest challenge to both private and public pensions. As long as the financial system remains vulnerable to excessive abuse, so does our retirement security.
Hahahaha - that's a good one. All of these plans are forecasting 7%+ returns. It will never happen.
I wonder what the FED's DB plan give it's employees ... probably assumes 10%
This is why I prefer a public solution to pensions which pools assets but you have to tighten up the governance. And you need to clean up Wall Street once and for all. That remains the biggest challenge to both private and public pensions. As long as the financial system remains vulnerable to excessive abuse, so does our retirement security.
You've got to be one of the biggest morons posting on ZH ...except GW of course, he's top moron here.
a public solution to pensions which pools assets
Hand it over to the criminals. Wonderful idea.
tighten up the governance.
Right. Sure.
clean up Wall Street once and for all
Right. Sure.
our retirement security
Forget it moron.
What Obama / CONgress / Wall Street doesn't loot away, Bernokio will debase away.
Better plan on working till you die ...or live on the street.
I have no clue huh? Okay you're the expert. So a wager? I think DB are dead and will not come back. You think they are the future.
A friendly wager? $100? in three years DB will be gone as an option for the vast majority of American workers? Are we on?
Yeah I wish I had a pension...and a convertible and a blonde...and that I didn't have to pay for lunch.
Leo, almost no one is hiring now. Mandating private sector DB plans will just make the employment picture that much worse.
American workers probably overwhelmingly favor job security for life too but only a fool would argue that such an entitlement wouldn't be a wet blanket on all but extra-legal economic activity.
Pension plan = personal savings. We in the U.S. have squandered our most profitable years. What ever happened to teaching to save in times of plenty for use in times of famine. Oh, that's right.....I can use my credit card instead......bwahahahahahaha.
Sportsguy Chestbump )))) (((( !
Only pension fund managers would be so shortsighted to not see this.
They will never return, not in a hypercompetitive world.
BUT...there will be at some point in the not too distant future when transfer payments will have to increase to the elderly via increased socialism or we'll have to have a Soylent Green type of 'retirement' plan, no kidding. There are going to be too many who are past their working years, growing by tens of millions each year. That is massively huge market to simply let starve to death, or more specifically, profit from. The major corporations that provide products and services to it will see that they continue to serve that market by paying off politicians to insure it. Though what exact form it will take is not yet clear.
Whatever happened to the notion of people saving for their retirement Leo.
Why should an employer have to pay for an employee's retirement? An employer makes a contribution to the plan the dipshits run their own plan.
Defined Contribution plans force these lazy fucks to manage their own affairs and investments.
People are simply too goddmaned lazy to learn to manage money - that is not OUR problem. Stop spoonfeeding these lazy arses and make them grow up and be responsible for their own affairs.
Employers aren't taking us back to the 19th century! They are tired of managing the affairs of their staff. Small business for instance cannot afford to manage pension plans. neither can government anymore.
The taxpayer is broke
The reason for the pension plan was that the employer would pay less up front but still providing to keep employees at that company for their entire working career. Something that companies really don't want these days as they have to (gasp) pay the more senior experienced people a higher wage.
Employers aren't taking us back to the 19th century, Wall Street and our government is.
And if you read the article, it shows that pensions ARE becoming more popular in small business.
I don't want a pension I wish the government leave me alone to invest and save on my own
401ks and IRAs were supposed to replace pension plans but those have been pillaged by banksters. Big surprise huh?
Actually 401s were suppose to be an upper level management perk to supplement pensions.
The lower paid employees and unions started demanding the same thing (how RUDE of them!)
And then companine's cpa's found away to get rid of the pesky pension plans by hawking the 401K instead.
(although it was still very RUDE of the 'lower classes' to hitch their raggady asses to the elite's 401Ks)
Read between the lines. For the last 30 years pundits have been screeching about the primary danger of DB plans; i.e. the risk that the ROI does not cover the committed future benefit (while the unmentioned risk of corporate buzzards looting the assets purportedly generating that ROI has proceeded unabated). Now that securities fraud and breaches of fiduciary duty are routinely ignored, the pendulum has swung. After all, with a policy commitment to debase the currency who wouldn't want to commit to a fixed stream of future payments?
Public sector = thieving sector. At this rate, there will be nothing left to steal. Dog food and Band-Aids, bitchez.
My neighbor, who worked for the State Department for 30 years, has accumulated 'several' million dollars on his Federal salary and makes over $100,000 per year in pension benefits ... and pays no health insurance premiums. The reality is that I paid for his nest egg and I am now paying for his pension and his health benefits.
But don't get me started.
Yes, it's a disgrace. The government agencies take care of their own; spending other peoples money. And nine-tenths of the "employees" are absolutely useless.
I'm going out on a limb here, but i doubt that 30 years at the State Department reflects the average federal worker. I imagine they pay a little better to attract the educated people that diplomacy requires.