I don’t get it. They say that the big elephant in the room is that we have underfunded retirement pensions and have relied on a paygo that will eat up available funds in payouts when the baby boomers retire. How is borrowing from that proportion which has already been prefunded going to help this problem?
You have to change your perspective. You are thinking like a private citizen looking for the a solution to a long term problem. Our representatives are not looking at it that way. Their goal is to say the problem is fixed. Many want to be able to go home with a budget that works for today so they can start campaigning for re-election.
The reward for the legislature is not set up to reward long term solutions. Heck, they will even be termed-out in the long term under California's term limit law. And they will have their pension.