The consequences of years spent living high on the hog

Consequences? You mean there are consequences? . . .

Not even the great economists of history can get us out of this fix - Telegraph: "To think that central bank money-printing offers a largely pain-free way out of our economic difficulties is sadly deluded. Carried to extremes, it ends in hyper-inflation, and in any case, in an era of low growth and the progressive loss of Western employment to technology and foreign competition, it does nothing for living standards. Wages may lag prices for years to come. Friedman offers some plausible solutions, but even he cannot magic away the consequences of years spent living high on the hog. One way or another, a price has to be paid."

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Chicago public schools pension crunch

Chicago LaLa Land--nobody wants to acknowlecge the "elephant in the room"--

Chicago public schools' pension crunch.: "I get annoyed when conservatives talking about the federal government running out of money, but listening to some progressive crowing about the outcome of the Chicago teachers strike it's also frustrating when people don't acknowledge that the city of Chicago most certainly can run out of money. Things like extra money for music and art teachers could be great ideas or could be bad ones depending on where it comes from. But it's not as if Chicago Public Schools is sitting on some giant pile of money that administrations have just been refusing to use. On the contrary, it's actually sitting on a large unfunded pension obligation:

Having skipped its pension contributions for many years, Chicago is supposed to start tripling them in another year under state law. But the school district has drained its reserves. And it cannot easily turn to the local taxpayers because of a cap on property taxes. Borrowing the money would be difficult and expensive as well, because of a credit downgrade this summer. One of the few remaining choices would be to make deep cuts in other services.

Like Chicago, many cities and school districts now face pension pressure after reducing their contributions in recent years to save money. Among the funds for different types of workers, teachers’ plans tend to be shortchanged more often, according to research done by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College for the New York Times."

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Microsoft Accused of Avoiding Tax

"A U.S. Senate committee memo said Microsoft Corp. used aggressive international tax maneuvers to avoid billions of dollars in taxes over the past three years."--one of Romney's 47%??

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Do You Want to Pay $9,000 for Someone Else's Pension?

The following article about Canada--same situation applies here in the U.S.--unfunded public pension liabilities:

Dan Kelly: Do You Want to Pay $9,000 for Someone Else's Pension?: "Imagine it's March, 2013 and you discover to your considerable horror that you must pay the government $9,000 in addition to the taxes you normally fork over. If every other Canadian made the same discovery, it's no small exaggeration to suggest there would be riots in the streets and governments would quickly find themselves out of office. Sounds pretty far-fetched, doesn't it? Well, you and I, and every other man, woman and child in Canada are each on the hook for an extra $9,000 to pay for the $300 billion (or more) in promises to public sector pension plans that governments don't have the money to pay. That's according to an excellent report, Canada's Hidden Unfunded Public Sector Pension Liabilities, by CFIB's chief economist, Ted Mallett."

Unfunded public pension liabilities in the U.S.? Just the states and local governments have at least 2 trillion dollars of unfunded public pension liabilities--

U.S. munis face $2 trillion in unfunded pension costs | Reuters: "U.S. states and localities have run up more than $2 trillion of unfunded pension liabilities, Moody's Investors Service said on Monday, citing data on plans offered by 8,500 local governments and over 14,000 individual entities.The Wall Street credit agency said that according to its estimate, the total liabilities for fiscal 2010 were more than three times the amount reported by local governments."

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Hogs at the Trough in Kentucky!

Remember the GSA scandal? Well, government bureaucrats in Kentucky think they're "entitled," recession or not!--

AP Exclusive: Ky. officials spend $128M on travel since '08; wildlife chief is top spender: "The AP found state bureaucrats have spent more than $128 million on travel since 2008 amid the worst economic recession in a generation. The recession led to a $1 billion state budget shortfall and forced deep spending cuts on government services and programs. Some agencies slashed up to 30 percent of their budgets, but travel was largely spared. The documents showed a relatively meager $2.1 million reduction — about 7 percent — in travel spending over the past four years. Richard Beliles, head of the government watchdog group Common Cause of Kentucky, said the reluctance of state leaders to cut travel spending "shows they're not sensitized to what the people in this recession are suffering.""

God forbid government employees have to cut back on travel!

Hogs at the Trough in Kentucky!

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Chicago Teachers Strike update

How Much Do Chicago Public School Teachers Make? « CBS Chicago: "Regardless of where Chicago teachers currently rank in salary (either 1st or 2nd in the nation!), Civic Federation president Laurenence Msall said there’s one big roadblock to a big raise for teachers. “It’s math. It’s not really politics, as much as it gets caught up in politics. The financial situation of the Chicago Public Schools is dire. The situation of the State of Illinois – that provides significant funding to the Chicago Public Schools – is dire,” he said. “The property tax payers in Chicago are beleaguered. They’re seeing a drop in their property values, and to be asking them to pay increased property taxes, so we can fund increased salaries for employees is something that’s gonna be a very tough political sell.” Msall said there’ simply not enough money to support a significant pay hike for the teachers."

And what about the kids? Have they been getting their "money's worth" from Chicago teachers? Hardly--

UPDATE 4-Both sides 'dug in' as Chicago teachers strike drags on | Reuters: "Both sides agree Chicago schools need fixing. Chicago students consistently perform poorly on standardized math and reading tests. About 60 percent of high school students graduate, compared with 75 percent nationwide and more than 90 percent in some affluent Chicago suburban schools. The fight does not appear to center on wages, with the school district offering an average 16 percent rise over four years and some benefit improvements. The union is fiercely opposed to Emanuel's demand that teacher performance be evaluated in part on the results of their students on standardized tests because it says teachers have no control over the conditions students face such as crime-ridden neighborhoods, poverty and disengaged parents. More than 80 percent of Chicago public school students qualify for free lunches at school because they come from low-income households . . ."  

In other words, because the kids come from poor neighborhoods, teachers should be unaccountable!

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How Much Do Chicago Public School Teachers Make?

How Much Do Chicago Public School Teachers Make? « CBS Chicago: "Salary figures provided by the Chicago Public Schools show teachers here have the highest average salary of any city in the nation. But, according to the Chicago Teachers Union’s calculations, Chicago teachers would rank second behind New York City."

And the teachers are on strike?

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Chicago teachers strike -- time for a reality check

View more videos at: http://nbcchicago.com.

Views under the Palm : Chicago teachers are either the highest paid in the U.S.(according to Chicago Public Schools) or second-highest paid (according to the teachers union). In either event, the Chicago teachers strike is hard to justify when you look at the math--or what some call the "arithmetic"-- How Much Do Chicago Public School Teachers Make? « CBS Chicago: "Regardless of where Chicago teachers currently rank in salary, Civic Federation president Laurenence Msall said there’s one big roadblock to a big raise for teachers. “It’s math. It’s not really politics, as much as it gets caught up in politics. The financial situation of the Chicago Public Schools is dire. The situation of the State of Illinois – that provides significant funding to the Chicago Public Schools – is dire,” he said. “The property tax payers in Chicago are beleaguered. They’re seeing a drop in their property values, and to be asking them to pay increased property taxes, so we can fund increased salaries for employees is something that’s gonna be a very tough political sell.” Msall said there’ simply not enough money to support a significant pay hike for the teachers." Bottom line--what you're seeing in Chicago is Obama Democratic Party politics come to full fruition. Suck the public treasury dry for public worker salaries and benefits. All those union donations to Democratic campaign coffers have driven Chicago and Illinois to the brink of bankruptcy--and it is still not enough! Is this what you want for the rest of the country?

There has got to be (and there is) a better way.

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Chicago Teachers Strike--when is enough, enough?

Striking Chicago teachers head to picket lines - CBS News: "A dispute involving public sector employees in Chicago was somewhat surprising, said CBS News correspondent Dean Reynolds, given the generous packages unions here have won in the past. In addition, a teacher strike in the hometown of a president who stresses the importance of education could also be seen as something of a political embarrassment."

When is enough, enough?

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CalSTRS "asleep at the switch"

State: Pension bosses missing cheaters - SFGate: "As public employee pensions swell beyond the state's ability to pay for them, a new review of the agency that oversees educators' retirement funds says it does a poor job of identifying cheaters. The California State Teachers' Retirement System is supposed to monitor pensions at more than 1,600 public schools and colleges, and crack down when it finds trouble. But when the state controller's office checked in on the vast pension fund, it found the agency asleep at the switch. . . ."

No wonder California is bankrupt.

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"the utmost extravagance of debauchery"

Buttonwood: Democracies and debt | The Economist: "most nations have not been democratic for much of their history and that, for a long time, democracy was a dirty word among political philosophers. One reason was the fear that democratic rule would lead to ruin. Plato warned that democratic leaders would “rob the rich, keep as much of the proceeds as they can for themselves and distribute the rest to the people”. James Madison, one of America’s founding fathers, feared that democracy would lead to “a rage for paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property and for any other improper or wicked projects”. Similarly John Adams, the country’s second president, worried that rule by the masses would lead to heavy taxes on the rich in the name of equality. As a consequence, “the idle, the vicious, the intemperate would rush into the utmost extravagance of debauchery, sell and spend all their share, and then demand a new division of those who purchased from them.”"

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Illinois' credit rating downgraded after pension reform failure

Looks like Illinois will spiral down faster and farther than even California!--

Illinois' credit rating downgraded after pension reform failure - Chicago Tribune: "Only California is ranked lower than Illinois by the S&P, with a credit rating of A-. But unlike Illinois, California has been given a "positive outlook." Illinois already has the lowest credit rating in the nation from Moody's Investors Service, which has warned that another downgrade is possible unless something is done to address the state's growing pension liabilities."

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