Courtesy of Mish.
Detroit’s emergency manager Kevyn Orr says a pension fund takeover is a “right, if not an obligation” after Orr learned of extra, unwarranted pension payments.
Please consider Emergency Manager Weighs Pension-Fund Takeover.
Kevyn Orr said in a recent interview that at the current pace, the city’s General Services System pension fund could lose its ability to pay pensions owed to current and future retirees within 12 years. A takeover is a “right, if not an obligation, that I have to consider under the statute, and we’re considering that right now,” he said.
Representatives of the pension board said Mr. Orr’s figures were faulty.
The Oct. 25 draft report by the city’s auditor general and inspector general, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, found that during the 12 years ended in fiscal year 2012, the pension funds paid $1.22 billion of interest credits into retirees’ savings accounts while the funds had losses of $2.05 billion, or 29% of their net asset value.
Earlier this year, Mr. Orr unveiled a proposal calling for the city to pay 20 cents on the dollar for the $3.5 billion that the city says it owes its two pension funds, one for 20,500 nonuniformed retirees and one for 12,700 retired police and firefighters.
“When workers in Chicago and L.A. realize that their pension benefits are no longer inviolate, unions are going to say what they really want is not bigger benefits but better funding. And that’s going to put enormous pressure on current budgets,” said Robert Novy-Marx, associate professor of finance at the Simon Business School at the University of Rochester.
A person familiar with the matter said Mr. Orr would like to engineer a takeover of the city’s General Retirement System for nonuniformed employees and retirees. Mr. Orr’s office estimates that the fund has only 64% of what it needs to meet its obligations, while fund officials put the figure at 80%. The separate fund for the city’s police and firefighters is in better shape, both Mr. Orr and fund officials say.
Michigan’s emergency-manager law allows for the takeover of a municipal pension system that is less than 80% funded.
20 Cents on the Dollar
Twenty cents on the dollar sounds about right to me. But Orr ought to take over both funds. More importantly, new rules are needed.
From my Lesson for Union Dinosaurs post …
I propose the final settlement should include ……
