Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire nine Cities that could follow Detroit into Bankruptcy

interesting article...

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/nine-cities-that-could-soon-follow-detroit-into-bankruptcy

Excerpt about Potlandia Oregon...

One has to wonder if Portland might deliberately drive itself into bankruptcy as part of a larger plan to become the hipster capital of the world.

Regardless, the largest city in Oregon is well on its way to financial trouble. Moody's is reviewing the city's credit rating for its general obligation bonds, but also for Portland's tax obligation bonds, housing bonds and redevelopment bonds. The city has more than $453 million in unfunded pension debt.

Pew notes Portland "had virtually no asset" to offset unfunded liabilities of $2.3 billion in fiscal 2009 for its pension and disability plan for police and firefighters. The city is essentially paying for the retirement costs of those uniformed employees on a pay-as-you-go basis, which any actuary can tell you is a terrible idea.

Pension debt is a problem for most cities. Houston isn’t on that list, but there is always something in the paper about the firefighters pension. I think they have free health insurance. They are all will eventually go to a 401 based retirement plan.

Note that it is all about unfunded pensions.

Can't pay people not work. It is great if you are collecting the pension, and a perk for working in certain fields, but is economically crippling beyond a minimum for any entity.

Liberal politicians buying the vote of city employees. Promising the moon if you will just vote for me. Taxpayers expected to keep that promise. Another reason taxes are so high in democrat states. Hasbeen

Unfunded pensions - just raise taxes - problem solved - - - - again .

Hire more govt workers to serve the citizens .

They are going to have to go the 401k route. You have the hypothetical third grade teacher retired for twenty years collection a pension. You have the current third grade teacher going on pension and the new third grade teacher collection a salary. Throw in some medical benefits for all three and third grade gets very expensive for the taxpayers. Its unsustainable.

Arent almost all those cities run by progressive genius dimocraps like Piddler, djs, Gayghost, Leroy, Nordman, Rollin turdner and Jell0. Guys who, unlike Trump, have a plan.

I expect that the next time the Democrats control the presidency, senate and house a major push will be made to "federalize", in some fashion, state and local unfunded pensions.

it's a morass, and was caused by many different issues. giving pensions instead of competitive pay. low-pay because gov't was an employer of last resort, and hired too many employees (at low-pay for the rank & file).

at least one school system in georgia has opted out of social security, and into a 401k self-managed savings system. works good, too.

pensions are on the way out across the board, yes they are unsustainable. but noone could have forecast it turning out the way it is. it was growth forever, remember?

Funny how all 9 are liberal nests...

Coincidence?

It used to be that working for the government meant somewhat lower wages, good retention, and decent benefits and pensions as opposed to their private employment counterparts. Over time, greed, unions and foolish bureaucrats and politicians raped the tax payers and soon these .gov jobs became very lucrative but mostly unfunded in the retirement benefit areas. This, as the list proves, is more prevalent in those communities predominantly ran by foolish lying lieberal demoncraps. The best solution would be to renegotiate benefits, as painful as that may be to some, and prohibit foolish lying lieberal demoncraps from running for anything but maybe their lives.

My buddy Lorne was a paramedic firefighter in Clayton County, Georgia. S. side of Atlanta. Retired in 2005, at age 55, he put in 30 years.
Firefighters in Clayton county went union thirty years ago, largely to get a sweetheart pension.

What they worked out was, the firefighter gets 100 PERCENT of his pay for the pension. This is bad enough, as in private industry, a person would be lucky to get 33 percent.
But, the pension was 100 percent of the average pay, of the last 3 years the guy worked. This is the big scam that the unions pulled.
So, when Lorne had 27 years in, he lived up in N. Georgia near the N. Carolina line. He had a 2 hour commute to work, not too bad because he only worked every 3rd day.
But, at that time, he bought a house in Clayton County.
So, he would drive down and work his regular shift. Then, a guy called in sick, he would volunteer for the overtime shift, knowing that every overtime he worked, he would continue to be paid for the rest of his life.
So, he would work a 48, then lay around his new house for a day, then work a 24, then go home to N. Georgia for 2 days.
Also was renting out his spare bedroom to another firefighter who was working the same scam.

So, in his last year of work Lorne was getting about $51K in pay which was pretty good for Georgia at that time. But, he piled in $14K a year, in those last 3 years, so that his pension is $65K a year for life. In the real world, private industry, he would have had to have had some executive job making $200K to get a pension like that, IF he was lucky because most executive jobs have gone over to 401K.
And he got very good medical for his wife and himself, $70 a month for the rest of his life. His wife was 58 and already had had back surgery, making her virtually uninsurable on the open market. I mean she could have gotten a policy but it would have cost $1100/month.

When Lorne retired, he simply sold the Clayton Co. house.

So, we have this guy living the life of a millionaire, he bought a new big Ford pickup and a nice Airstream, drives out to Idaho and spends the winter out there skiing. Has to lay awake at night to think of ways to spend his money.
This is the unholy alliance between government employees and unions. These massive pensions are probably going to drive Clayton County broke.

Louisiana's state pension plan was $19 million in da hole 8 years back! Ain't no telling what it is now!!

All first responders deserve pensions like his ! Or more .

You are being sarcastic, I hope. There in Clayton County they have about a dozen substations. There is one, out in the country in a nice neighborhood, where they average one call every 3 days.
That is where old guys waiting for retirement go because the young bucks want action!
Lorne spent his last 5 years at that substation, every 24 hour shift there was one chance in three you would run a call, and a good chance that call was a dumpster fire, or a seizure. Yes, we know that firemen risk their lives every day, these firemen were at risk of being bored to death.

You pay for personally then.

Government workers never made less than their private sector counterparts...that lie was repeated so many times with the intention of it becoming a fact.

Well the article is 5 years old. Have any gone belly up yet?

ILL. has floated a plan where they will add a 1% tax, paid yearly, on the gross value of one's house. This 1% tax is also intended for business owners as well. The money is for pensions in the state. A homeowner with a $350,000 house will pay a $3500 tax on top of their already high real estate tax. Not to worry they say, the tax will not increase over 1% and it will be dropped once ILL. is back in the black

Maybe not in Massachusetts, but was not a lie in capitalist states, at least when government was still of the people, by the people and for the people.

When government became of the government, by the government and for the government that all changed.