Gingrich Pushing Bill To Allow States To File Bankruptcy Allowing Them To Renege On Pensions

[IScreamSundays]

Newt Gingrich Pushing Bill To Allow States To File Bankruptcy Allowing Them To Renege On Pension And Benefit Obligations

Some unpleasant news for pensioned workers who believe that their insolvent state will be able to afford ridiculous legacy pensions in perpetuity. According to Pensions and Investment magazines, Newt Gingrich is pushing for legislation that will allow insolvent states to be taken off bailout support and file bankruptcy, in the process allowing them to renege on pension and other benefit obligations promises to state workers. And if there is anything that will get government workers' blood pressure to critical levels, it is the threat that money they had taken for granted is about to be lifted, courtesy of living in an insolvent state (pretty much all of them). And obviously what this means for equity investors in assorted muni investments is that a complete wipe out is becoming a possibility, as Meredith Whitney's prediction, which everyone was quick to mock and ridicule, is about to come back with a vengeance.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/newt-gingrich-pushing-bill-allow-states-file-bankruptcy-allowing-them-renege-pension-and-ben

[old guy]

1. When did he get elected and to what post?

[HereSince1628]

2. ridiculous legacy pensions???

Wow, fair AND balanced!

[Angry Dragon]

3. Time to stop all congressional pensions then

[DCKit]

4. Which states are financially healthy?

And I mean the ones who are showing a balanced budget, or even a surplus, without accounting sleight of hand or actual fraud?

Seriously, I'm thinking of moving.

[Still a Democrat]

5. Which is what happens to private sector workers

I don't like Newt, either, but why would public pensions be more jealously guarded than private pensions?

[chowhound]

7. shouldn't all pensions should be " jealously "guarded .nt.

[liberalhistorian]

6. "Money they've taken for granted?"

No, motherfuckers, how about money they've fucking EARNED and PUT INTO THE FUCKING PENSION through something called WORK. And just WTF do they expect the old, retired workers to live on, anyway? Many of the states have "windfall prevention" laws that prohibit state and municipal workers and teachers and police/firemen from paying into social security while they're paying into their pensions.

My parents were teachers and in their state, by law they weren't ALLOWED to pay into social security, it HAD to be into the state teachers retirement system, period. Ten percent of each and every fucking paycheck went into it. And they WORKED and worked damned fucking hard. And got shit for it, too. My stepdad had to retire earlier than planned due to the onset of a dementia disease and is now in a nursing home permanently, while my mom has to give up most of his pension check to the nursing home before Medicaid pays the rest each month; she is so "graciously" permitted to keep a small portion of the pensions by state Medicaid law and is barely hanging on as it is. With the corporatist anti-teacher anti-Medicaid new repuke governor of the state, who openly demanded that teachers apologize publicly for the ads they took out against him during the campaign, he could not only reduce their pensions even further, but change the Medicaid laws so that she has to pay even more per month now than she is, which she absolutely could not afford. She doesn't have a spare fucking penny now. And this motherfucker who has a permanent pension courtesy of the very taxpayers he's so eager to fuck over wants to take the only source of income away from elders who've fucking EARNED it, unlike him? FUCK. HIM.

And this would include police and fire officers as well. If I were one, I'd say fuck you, protect yourselves from now on, motherfuckers. I would no longer risk my life for them.

[cbdo2007]

8. I'm currently pushing a bill to have his head and ass surgically....oh wait, nevermind.

Ha ha hahahahaha, someone who doesn't have any power pushing a bill. That sounds like a winner.

[GeorgeEngel]

10. Single-payer retirement?

I'm not surprised, considering how they've been trying to systematically destroy retirement for everyone. Pensions were used in the 1980s to fund Wall Street takeovers of corporations. Then the corporations were looted, and the pensions defaulted. What a victory for capitalism. :-/ Whatever it takes to keep the bonuses coming into the usual suspects in lower Manhattan.

If single-payer health care is a good idea (and it is) why isn't single-payer retirement?

[PA Democrat]

9. Give up YOUR congressional pension first, Newt!

Why do corporate lackeys like Newt even NEED a pension? They go straight from congress to a well-paid lobbyist gig. If they are allowed to do that then they deserve no pension.

[Yavin4]

11. And This Would Decimate A State's Ability to Raise Capital Outside of Taxes

Because no sane person will ever buy a state's bond if they can walk away from their obligations. So, the states would see skyrocketing interest rates on their debt or raise the money to run their states purely through tax hikes or stop delivering services all together.

Think massive prison releases.

[GeorgeEngel]

12. Most people are in prison...

For non-violent offenses, like not being able to afford a decent lawyer.

Bottom line is that the prison-industrial complex could take a 50% cut and that money put into schools, work/vocational programs and drug treatment and we'd come out ahead, by a substantial margin.

However, the states would lose prison labor at $0.25 per DAY. Few care because, its most people of color that are being exploited.