Posted on 10/19/2016 9:05:18 AM PDT by Lorianne
Dallas Police Retiring in Droves, Taking Lump Sum Pensions, Fearing the Money Isn’t There (And It Isn’t)
The Dallas police and firefighters pension fund has just 45% of the money it needs to cover benefits. The fund rates to be out of money in 15 years at the current rate of withdrawals.
For those eligible, the sane thing to do is retire and take a lump sum payout before the money is all gone.
That’s precisely what’s happening, and it is further pressuring the system.
(Excerpt) Read more at mishtalk.com ...
Very understandable. With the president and the likely next president giving full support to the BLM crowd, they see the handwriting on the wall.
I don’t blame them at all! We have a family member that just became a cop; I’ll never understand it, though a lot of people thought *I* was nuts joining the Army so soon after Vietnam. *SHRUG*
Beau and I decided a year ago that we were going to stop being, ‘Producers’ (other than for ourselves) and both of us retired in 2016; me in January, he in August.
Smartest thing we’ve ever done. :)
You’ve got two problems here.
One, policemen quitting because the politicians don’t back them up.
Two, public employee defined benefit pension plans are ruinous all across the board. There should only be defined contribution plans for public employees.
Oh that’ll leave a mark. Dallas, being a large and (I assume, have no idea whatsoever) reasonably well funded and well run (meaning they are not 100% self-funding their pension obligations) can probably absorb this OK.
Few hundred cops in Cleveland do this could crush city finances which probably aren’t that great to begin with.
Move to create Federal Police force.
Imagine what the ‘boys in blue’ from California will do when they look at their retirement fund. Nada. Zippo. Nothing.
“Two, public employee defined benefit pension plans are ruinous all across the board. There should only be defined contribution plans for public employees.”
I have a personal friend who was our town’s first police chief. He’s been forceably retired for about 15 years due to medical issues. While we are trying to figure out how to get to the end of the road with our decimated 401k’s he’s drawing in excess of $160k per year plus H/C beneifits. So I’m not at all “understanding” of the “public service employees plight” in Dallas. There is something fundamentally wrong with pension systems that end up providing more income in retirement than these people got during their working life. And here in CA “public safety” employees get to retire at age 50, which means they will, on average draw pensions for at least another 30 years. You all do the math, it’s not sustainable no matter what these people were “promised” by the government.
Go long on private police corporation stocks.
RoboCop dystopic city film was quite prescient.
Or more likely they see the brick in the back of the head.
I don’t blame them either
I do not want to come across as arrogant; but based on 60+ years of fighting for traditional American values, including hours of using live TV to advantage, I want to share some experience driven suggestions, both for our candidate, and all of us who will be actively promoting a Trump victory in just 20 days.
While speaking in anger can sometimes help rally those who share your beliefs and priorities, it is not the most effective way to convert those who dissent from our purpose. When there is a real problem to be addressed, it is almost always better to speak in sorrow than in anger.
In the present ideological conflict, there is great reason for sorrow. We need to interject, in every possible exchange, those contemporary phenomena that are not only unfortunate from our stand point; but which are likely to be understood as sad by anyone listening to us.
Putting this understanding to work in a situation such as tonight's Presidential debate; Trump needs to intertwine his response to essential policy issues, by sadly lamenting the background social climate, which certainly impacts all aspects of contemporary American life, including the problem reflected in the issue. For example:
The decline in pride in heritage, openly encouraged by Obama's repeated apologies to others for America's traditions & achievement--leading to Americans kneeling through the Star Spangled Banner;--his & Mrs. Clinton's siding with Soros financed thugs against the Police--leading to the cold blooded assassination of American cops;--their refusal to protect the border, leading to job losses among rooted Americans, brutal crimes against American women, and the despicable riots in California, where aliens who do not share our values, or honor our heritage, intimidate local officials into not celebrating the achievements of the Founding Fathers and their posterity.
It was only last week, when anti-American culturalists advocated not celebrating Columbus Day! The Obama/Clinton cabal seem intent on denying that our values & achievements, under uniquely American cultural values, grew directly out of the experience driven values of particular European settlers. That is fact. It takes nothing away from the achievements or values of any other people; but it is our fact, and we are entitled to honor that fact and the rich cultural heritage it reflects.
To the extent that the Obama/Clinton cabal would deny us pride in our history, they are truly bigoted enemies. But we do best, again, when we lament the success of our enemies, as we explain, again quietly and sadly, how totally despicable is this ongoing attack, coming indeed from those who have benefited so much, while gaming our system.
Some may think that this approach is going soft. It is precisely the opposite. In place of venting our wrath at the Obama/Clinton betrayal, we begin to instill wrath in some of those who otherwise would simply go along with the enemy, "to get along."
There is nothing the least bit new in these tactics. Anyone familiar with Shakespeare's play "Julius Caesar," is quite familiar with the technique. It worked in the play because it reflects a true understanding of the psychological factors involved.
William Flax
[This may be reproduced, if in full context, with or without attribution.]
To keep up with that promise the governing board got extremely aggressive with investments. In some years they did very well, but it has now backfired on them.
without economic growth, pensions are unsustainable. You can only tax the ‘rich’ so much.
Not even close to sustainable and we are paying all the bills for it.
Politicians kick the can down the road repeatedly and we pay the bills or our property is confiscated. It that is not illegal seizure I don’t know what is.
Well said. I’m only surprised the kukka hasn’t hit the fan sooner.
One of the reasons that the pension fund is in trouble is that the bosses lived large on the ‘investments’. For example, a luxury vacation home in Hawaii for them to ‘inspect’ when they needed a vacation.
Then there were the high risk real estate investments carried on their books at far more than the actual value.
Everything blew up when one of their investments started cooking the sculpture garden, causing a split in the cabal that runs Dallas.
I understand why they are doing it, but they have to protect themselves against currency devaluation & inflation. The USSR was filled with retirees who couldn’t buy much with their pensions...
It's helpful to read the article. They're bailing because it's better to take their money now rather than wait and find the retirement fund is bankrupt and their pensions reduced to next to nothing. The job has nothing to do with it.
Replaced with little Hispanic girl anchor babies who love Hillary.
The taxpayers are going to have to bail out the pension fund. As Ken noted, they were guaranteeing returns that weren’t rational. Basically, the older folks were looting the fund at the expense of the younger guys (or more accurately, the taxpayers). Coupled with, as I noted above, a leadership team at the fund which was living large off of other people’s money.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.