Public Pension Problems -- Proposed Solutions, But Will They Fix Anything?

Let’s look at the condition of Minnesota Teachers, Connecticut state funds, and Chicago pensions, and three different (actually more) proposals to fix what ails these systems.While Chicago is actually in the worst situation, the proposals for Chicago sound the most realistic in terms of fixing its problems.Edward Siedle’s linksMar 2024: Minnesota Teachers Fundraise Forensic Audit of State Pension SystemApr 2024: Minnesota Teacher Pension Forensic Investigation Invites Whistleblower, Expert And Public ParticipationMinnesota Teachers in Public Plans DatabaseMinnesota Teachers Retirement Association - contains two plans in the database: Duluth Teachers and Minnesota Teachers. Duluth is small in terms of participants, so I will just link Minnesota Teachers plan.Minnesota Teachers pension plan. Some selected graphs:Connecticut pension linksHartford Courant op-ed10 Ways to reform public pension fundsImprovements in the state's historical investment underperformance can alleviate the crushing income tax burden of transferring $7.7 billion in surplus contributions from state tax revenues to pay down the pension burden, and relieve state public employees and teachers from being docked an additional 2% of their wages each year to cover the investments hole. With even average performance in the past, Connecticut's income tax might have been sliced in half or more.Given the scale of this challenge, it is remarkable that decades of underperformance of Connecticut's pension funds escaped public notice and scrutiny for as long as it did, until last year, when we revealed in a 113-page research report how Connecticut's pension funds have had one of the worst investment track records of all 50 peer states, across all timeframes, which garnered significant attention and calls to action from across the state. Given the asset management and endowment investing expertise in Connecticut, this was a tragic paradox.Yale Business Report113-slide version: The Investment Challenges Facing Connecticut’s Pension Funds - Jan 2023.pdfShorter version: Why Connecticut’s Investments Are UnderperformingPie charts w/ the Excel defaults:They actually cleaned it up a little bit from the originals.Washington PensionsConnecticut PensionsAs you can see, there is a very salient different between the two states.And here we go:Chicago pension linksPress Release, 5 Apr 2024: Harris School of Public Policy Announces Policy Innovation Challenge's Winning Student-Led Pension ProposalOp-eds from the finalistsRead each team's op-ed via the links below: The winning team: Opinion: Here's a roadmap to financial stability with Chicago's pensionsBy Syed Ahmad , Anthony Beaupre , Liam Gluck , James Karsten , Greg RuddOpinion: To fix Chicago's pensions, consider a change in public opinionBy Eddie Andujar , Andy Fan , Andre Oviedo , Alberto SaldarriagaOpinion: Two paths to funding Chicago's pension futureBy Anna Weiss , Purva Sarkango , Devyanshi DubeySTUMP - Meep on public finance, pensions, mortality and more is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to STUMP - Meep on public finance, pensions, mortality and more at marypatcampbell.substack.com/subscribe