LONG ISLAND BULLETIN BOARD

This may be a nice start as the state has passed a new pension plan called Tier 6 for new employees, but at the end of the day ALL TIERS NEEDS TO BE LOOKED AT !!! I believe this is just a band aid on a person who is bleeding out, and the saving of this new plan will not be recognized for many years down the road...Today is the problem that needs to be dealt with which should not have any tier protected...Everything should be on the table, and looked at...The sooner people realize this the better we all will be...

Wonderful idea, are you forgetting those tiers were agreed upon contracts? Long before the banks defrauded the world of all their monies, these were and still are binding contracts. Why not go after the mortgage fraud bankers who plundered the retirement system to the tune of 25 billion dollars?
All through colluded, (not worthy), triple A ratings, Unsuspecting fund managers, (DiNapoli), bought these fraud laden vehicles as safe investments...
Why not wring the cash from these criminal bankers and when finished retrieving our monies, jail these criminals?
People chose careers based on Civil service promises, they did without bonuses, expense accounts etc, and the other perks non civil service personnel enjoyed. The tides changed, either correct the illness , (the banks), or make future corrections, tier 6, new employees.
Reneging on yesterdays promises is morally wrong.

Contracts can be renegotiated can't they? Tell me who were the people involved in negotiating these contracts anyway? Did the taxpayer have a say? Don't think so..Many people lost money in their 401 plans when the s h i t hit the fan did anyone come in, and rescue them for the hundred of thousands they lost in their plans? Find the people on the fraud side and prosecute them to the fullest I am all for it, but we can not afford the pension and other bene's that were promised back then TODAY..Is it right for the for the person that lost thousands in their 401, and now have to pay more in taxes to supplement the TRS or other state plans? My answer is no Fnnn way..Suffolk goes from 100 mil to close to 200 mil just in 1 year for retirement and other bene plans that are out of control...Keep going down this road, and maybe we will file for bankruptcy, and then everything gets to be renegotiated

The large amount that local districts currently must contribute toward the pension system is a temporary thing. In a couple of years, that number will drop considerably. So, in reality, the pension system as currently constituted is entirely sustainable. Any politician telling you otherwise is either not being honest or does not have a full understanding of how our state's retirement system is funded.


Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo's hype machine went into overdrive late last week after the Legislature passed a scaled-back version of his Tier 6 pension reform plan.
Cuomo said the result was "bold and transformational . . . a historic win for New York taxpayers and municipalities."
A more accurate description would have been "an incremental improvement on what we've got . . . and better than nothing."
The bill creates a new public pension plan that's roughly one-third less costly for employers than the Tier 5 plan adopted just over two years ago. The new plan achieves this mainly by shifting a larger share of pension costs to future employees, through an increase in contributions deducted from their paychecks.
Unions cried foul, but the benefit reduction for new workers will be slight. The retirement age will be nudged up one year, from 62 to 63, and a general employee with 35 years of service will be guaranteed 65 percent of final average salary, instead of the 67.5 percent available under Tiers 4 and 5. While retirement severance payouts will be excluded from the pension base, police and others approaching retirement can still pad their benefits by choosing work schedules that generate extra pay, including the same generous overtime allowance provided by Tier 5.
Cuomo says Tier 6 will save $80 billion over 30 years, but this needs to be taken with a big grain of salt. Tax-funded pension costs will continue to increase over the next few years, because the changes apply only to employees hired on or after April 1. Tier 6 will take more than a decade to generate significant savings compared to what it is replacing.
Long-term savings projections assume benefits will be left absolutely unchanged for the next 30 years. But state lawmakers have been tinkering with pensions for decades, and government unions certainly won't stop lobbying for more now.
The only way to break decisively with this cycle is to shift to a whole different structure, such as the individualized and portable defined-contribution retirement accounts popular among State University of New York employees. In the end, however, Cuomo was able to deliver a defined-contribution plan only as an option for higher-paid nonunion employees. It's a nice step in the right direction, but he should have pushed for more.
There's one more, widely overlooked piece of Tier 6 law that might actually qualify as "transformational," but not in a good sense.
Near the end of the law are three curious sections headed "Benefit Enhancements," which give most unions representing state workers, New York City employees and teachers an avenue to petition for a revised plan allowing Tier 6 employees to retire and collect full pensions at age 57 after 30 years on the payroll. The governor alone (or, in New York City, the mayor) will have discretion to grant such requests. In the wrong hands, this power could be abused by executives pandering to large, well-organized voter blocs.
The cost of any benefit enhancement is supposed to be covered entirely by "additional member contributions." The problem is that these amounts will be calculated on the basis of the pension systems' already dubious accounting methodology, creating a risk that early retirement will be underpriced and lead to substantial unfunded liabilities. The same concern applies to another Tier 6 provision requiring the state to pick up the cost of any future pension sweeteners. Sounds good, on the surface, but the fuzzy math of the pension system will still make it too easy to sell big benefit increases, to themselves and the public, as a free lunch -- as then-Gov. George Pataki and the legislature did in 2000.
The fundamental flaw in New York's public pension system remains unresolved: Like similar systems across the country, it exposes taxpayers to massive open-ended financial risk.
Unfortunately, Cuomo has not even acknowledged this problem, much less fixed it. So we're still waiting for a true transformation.
E.J. McMahon is senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute's Empire Center for New York State Policy.
This is a corrected version of the column. An earlier version misstated the percent of final average salary available under Tiers 4 and 5.

Contracts can be renegotiated, the key here is negotiated, not mandated. They were negotiated through collective bargaining.. Both sides gave a little. Does the taxpayer ever have a say? 80% of the taxpayers were against the corporate bailouts? Did they listen? no....That amounted to TRILLIONS when it was finally admitted, we are talking millions +...The fraud folks are quite obvious, start with, " I don't know where the 1 BILLION DOLLARS went" Corzine..
I'm talking contracts not speculation..Monies pensioners paid into the system..
There are more bank bailouts coming as they shuffle to hide their fraud laced bundled mortgage instruments.. They must keep buying back these fraud laden instruments, (or risk going to prison).
Trillions in U.S. gold backed bearer bonds just surfaced in Europe, to balance the Greek deficit. If Europe defaults the fraud laced CREDIT DEFAULT SWAPS of our bailed out banks are activated and they are liable for 100's of TRILLONS, ( yes TRILLONS, no typo). You the taxpayer are on the hook for this as the banks were kind enough to shift this liability over to the savings side of their books..
The savings side are GUARANTEED by the FDIC. Here's the kicker, they get paid first before us the personal savings account holders. Oh, did I mention we are also responsible for the 25 TRILLION in Bearer bonds.. DID YOU HAVE A SAY in THIS? I didn't and still don't..
Keep your eye on the prize, we are talking peanut SHELLS when compared to what's really robbing us.

Let's get the monsters charging us $100 a week in gas and $500 a month in oil first.
We seem to be accepting of their BS (and when you look at the daily profit of these companies you will see why we shouldn't be).
Talk about a tightly controlled monopoly- they are worse than any union imaginable.

Teachers seem to take the brunt of the attacks while we have bigger fish to fry.