Tag: unfunded liability

TRUST? ILLINOIS STILL REFUSES TO PAY ITS PENSION BILL.

Mary Pat Campbell
Trust? Illinois still refuses to pay its pension bill.

Excerpt:

Only the statutory contribution is not what the state owes to meet its obligation and prevent more debt. “Statutory” should be translated as the legislature made up a number and blew it out their collective butts.

The actuarial amount owed, the amount actually needed to keep from growing the liability is several billion more that the statutory amount.

They short the pension system every year, after year, after year, after year. And this year again.

Not exactly a trust-building thing, right?

Author(s): Fred Klonsky

Publication Date: 28 February 2021

Publication Site: Fred Klonsky

Illinois’ record-setting pension debt jumps to over $300 billion – Wirepoints

Mary Pat Campbell
Illinois’ record-setting pension debt jumps to over $300 billion – Wirepoints

Graphic:

Excerpt:

The state assumes the pension funds will continue to earn an average of nearly 7 percent a year, while Moody’s lowered its assumptions for 2020 to just 2.7 percent: “the FTSE Pension Liability Index, a high-grade corporate bond index Moody’s uses to value state and local government pension liabilities, fell to 2.70% as of June 30, 2020, from 3.51% the prior year.”

Moody’s also reported that the asset-to-payout ratio for the state’s funds are now equal to about seven years’ worth of payouts.

That’s down compared to Wirepoints’ report on asset-to-payout ratios we released last year in this report: COVID-19 pushes nation’s weakest public pension plans closer to the brink: A 50-state survey. 

Author(s): Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner

Publication Date: 4 March 2021

Publication Site: Wirepoints

HIDDEN PENSION ‘TAX’ COSTS EACH ILLINOISAN MORE THAN $1,400 PER YEAR

Mary Pat Campbell

Link: https://www.illinoispolicy.org/hidden-pension-tax-costs-each-illinoisan-more-than-1400-per-year/

Graphic:

Excerpt:

Despite the record increase in pension expenditures in the past several decades, Illinois’ pension system remains the nation’s worst by multiple measures. According to Moody’s Investors Service, Illinois’ pension debt was equal to 500% of the state’s revenues in fiscal year 2018 and almost 30% of the entire state economy, both the highest rates in the nation. At the same time, Illinois’ credit rating has been in precipitous decline and now sits at the lowest credit rating in the nation.

As pension debt continues to increase, so do required pension contributions. Pension contributions now consume 26.5% of the state’s general funds budget, up from less than 4% during the years 1990 through 1997.

Author(s): Orphe Divounguy, Bryce Hill

Publication Date: 2 March 2021

Publication Site: Illinois Policy Institute