US Politics: Competence Crisis?

[DanteGabriel]

Its necessary. Illinois pensions were just insanely over-the-top generous to state employees for far too long; far, far more generous* than what people could get from comparable positions elsewhere and far more expensive than the state could've ever afforded.

*For instance, most employees, including part-timers, can retire at age 55 if they've worked at least 20 years for the state and receive 80% of their salary annually as their pension. And I"m not just talking about police and firefighters, I mean regular state agency employees.

Wow, thanks for the perspective. Never realized it was that cushy.

Is Illinois particularly notable for the generosity of pensions for state employees?

[awesome possum]

I've found a new hero in Congress

A former English teacher has taken to marking GOP memos with red pen and then returning them to the Reps who wrote them. Hilarity ensues.

Hoping that members of the House of Representatives will start using facts and coherent logic to advance the nation's interest is still a fool's errand, but there's one member of Congress, Rep. Mark Takano (D-CA), who's willing to at least pretend it's possible. Breaking out the teacher's most potent weapon, a red pen, he marked up Republican House members' letter to John Boehner forcing asking him to resist the immigration reform bill that has already passed America's slightly-less-insane upper chamber. Included in his comments are some words we haven't seen on a Congressional document in years, like "evidence," as well as an awesome invitation to "come by my office" if "you don't understand the bill."

[awesome possum]

Double post for more Elizabeth Warren awesomeness. She's trying to get a new Glass-Steagall bill passed

The 21st Century Glass Steagall Act would break up big banks by separating traditional retail banking (checking, savings) from riskier banking activities including swaps dealing and private equity and hedge fund activity.

John McCain (R-AZ) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) joined Warren in introducing the bill today which they say reduces the risk of another financial crisis and decreases risk to the American taxpayer.

“Despite the progress we’ve made since 2008, the biggest banks continue to threaten the economy,” said Senator Elizabeth Warren. “The four biggest banks are now 30% larger than they were just five years ago, and they have continued to engage in dangerous, high-risk practices that could once again put our economy at risk,” she added in a statement today."

I know it doesn't have a chance in hell of passing, but its good to know someone powerful in the Senate is trying to do something about the banks and the insane amount of power they wield.

[DanteGabriel]

I know it doesn't have a chance in hell of passing, but its good to know someone powerful in the Senate is trying to do something about the banks and the insane amount of power they wield.

I love my Senator.

I also worry about what Big Finance will do to destroy her.

[awesome possum]

I love my Senator.

I also worry about what Big Finance will do to destroy her.

I imagine they're content knowing they have so many Senators and Reps in their pockets it will never get passed. If she ever decides to run for president, though? I can imagine the dump trucks full of money they'll throw at her opponent.

[Fez]

Wow, thanks for the perspective. Never realized it was that cushy.

Is Illinois particularly notable for the generosity of pensions for state employees?

These days, yeah, absolutely. Most states have been transitioning away from defined benefit pensions for some time* whereas Illinois still has one that was cushier than pretty much any other state;s ever was. Maybe 20 or 30 years ago the gap wasn't quite as notable, but these days, its enormous.

*The bare minimum that nearly every other state has done (assuming that they even were more generous beforehand) is move all non-police/firefighters/other emergency personal/teachers over to defined contribution plans, with current employees/retirees grandfathered in to keep their old plans. Now these plans are usually more generous than just a 401(k), with the states putting in a decent amount of money themselves, but still require employee contributions. And usually employees need to work closer to 30 years before the level of state support starts getting generous. And that's the minimum, some states have done a lot more pension reform (although states have lost lawsuits trying to make too many changes to current employees' pensions).

Now I don't think Illinois should adopt Alabama's pension system or anything like that. But they do need to make some serious reforms because right now they are like GM before the bankruptcy, laden with pension promises that they can't hope to ever keep and that they really shouldn't have offered in the first place.

[Guest]

Yglesias made a good point about Glass-Steagall, and I say this as someone who still would love to see it return:

It won't be a panacea.

Washington Mutual was a purely commercial bank that completely tanked, and Lehman was an investment bank that completely tanked.

I love Warren and welcome this development. Just want to point out that there's more rot in the financial sector than that one move can fix.

[Fez]

We joke about it so much, I don't know how to react knowing that someone actually did it:

A tiny Georgia city and a national gun control group are facing off in a legal battle over a city ordinance requiring gun ownership, with the constitutionality of the law and broader messages about gun rights taking center stage.

The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence in May filed a federal lawsuit against Nelson, a city of roughly 1,300 residents about 50 miles north of Atlanta, saying a recently adopted ordinance requiring heads of household to own a gun and ammunition is unconstitutional.

:shocked:

[Maltaran]

Any Quakers or suchlike who can challenge it on religious grounds?

[Fez]

Any Quakers or suchlike who can challenge it on religious grounds?

There's a religious exemption, so they don't have to.

In the article, the Brady Center lawyers suggest their going to make a First Amendment challenge.

[The Progressive]

Yglesias made a good point about Glass-Steagall, and I say this as someone who still would love to see it return:

It won't be a panacea.

Washington Mutual was a purely commercial bank that completely tanked, and Lehman was an investment bank that completely tanked.

I love Warren and welcome this development. Just want to point out that there's more rot in the financial sector than that one move can fix.

That's a good point. There is list kept by the FDIC detailing the names of failed bank since the great recession .......... the majority of them are purely traditional banks.

We joke about it so much, I don't know how to react knowing that someone actually did it:

:shocked:

I eagerly await the horde of posters who bitched and whined about the ACA mandate to come here and express their outrage over this requirement, lol.

In other news, the teabaggers in the house passed the farm bill loaded with subsidies for agri business but stripped out funding to foods stamps.

[Shryke]

Yglesias made a good point about Glass-Steagall, and I say this as someone who still would love to see it return:

It won't be a panacea.

Washington Mutual was a purely commercial bank that completely tanked, and Lehman was an investment bank that completely tanked.

I love Warren and welcome this development. Just want to point out that there's more rot in the financial sector than that one move can fix.

The question though is why did those banks fail. One of the major issues with the collapse was how far the rot had spread. It had it's fingers in every bank.

[fuseprime]

I eagerly await the horde of posters who bitched and whined about the ACA mandate to come here and express their outrage over this requirement, lol.

In other news, the teabaggers in the house passed the farm bill loaded with subsidies for agri business but stripped out funding to foods stamps.

I for one do not agree with subsidies for farmers because you're essentially raising one class of farmer over the other. However, subsidies for something like corn, for example, wouldn't exclusively be a Republican only issue, as Democratic Congressmen have historically supported this as well. The only reason there was push-back to this bill was the exclusion of food stamp funding.

[Mad Monkey]

We joke about it so much, I don't know how to react knowing that someone actually did it:

:shocked:

I vaguely remember reading about that law before. If I remember it right, the law itself is actually toothless; there isn't really a penalty for not owning a gun. They just passed it to prove a point and tweak the noses of gun control advocates.

[TerraPrime]

Illinois:

Quinn's gesture would have been meaningful, if it were not for the fact that he's one of the people responsible for stonewalling a bill that would repair the budget in just the way he said he wanted. The only catch of that bill is that it locks the pension fund so that it can no longer be accessed by anyone other than to pay for pensions. Three guesses as to why Quinn didn't like that bill - Go.

As for pension in Illinois, remember that we (I work for the Illinois state government) do not get federal social security. So the money we receive when we retire from the Illinois system is all that we will have (aside from IRA or other personal investments). So it may seem large, but it should be seen as pension PLUS social security.

Furthermore, the employees have been paying our share of contribution all these years, and the only reason why we're in such dire conditions is because the state government, you know, the people entrusted by law to manage the pension money, had appropriated monies out of it to fund other projects.

So even if we accept that the pension scheme is "too generous," the way to fix that is to not offer the same pension scheme to new employees, not to slash the pension of all the people who had worked with the contract of the extant plan.

I'll also point out that the state government had already reduced pension benefits for new employees. New employees hired after 2011 already have reduced benefits and increased contribution, and at the time, the government told the unions that this was the only cut they'd need to fix everything. Yeah, right, we saw it a mile away that it would not be so.

The current proposal that makes the most sense is the We Are One project, which increases contribution from employees across the board*, as well as implementing a progressive income tax in Illinois (currently we have a flat rate for income tax). It also forestalls taking money from the pension funds by the government.

*This means that I, and all the public employees, will be paying more for the pension benefits that I was already promised under contract when I signed up for the job. In other words, we are taking money out of our own pockets to help fix the irresponsible budget mess of the state government.

[WrathOfTinyKittens]

TP - Question about social security for you guys. Assuming that what was posted earlier is true (full benefits for retirement after 20 years of service), it is easy to see that a 25-year old could retire from the state workforce at 45 and then work 10-20 years in private industry where he or she pays into SS. Under those circumstances, this person would receive both, no?

[DanteGabriel]

Terra, thanks, that's helpful extra perspective, and just the sort of information I was looking for.

[TerraPrime]

I don't beleive it is 20 years. The number I heard is 30 years. I also don't know where the numbers cited come from (average? median?maximum?)

Here's a PDF file for the booklet on Illinois state employee retirement plans.

It is also possible to receive a part of social security if you have worked in another state for a substantial amount of time, but then, if you had, you wouldn't be getting the maximum pension from Illinois either, unless you manage to work beyond retirement age.

[Commodore]

HB2 senate debate happening right now, vote could be tonight

live stream

http://www.youtube.com/user/thetexastribune?v=2Q8Hr0O20LY

[TrackerNeil]

I eagerly await the horde of posters who bitched and whined about the ACA mandate to come here and express their outrage over this requirement, lol.

I suspect you'll wait a good long time for anything more than, "I oppose this."