It’s been said that after Al Capone was sentenced to prison for tax evasion in 1931, his chief financial and legal advisor, Jake “Greasy Thumb” Guzik, told other mobsters how to avoid Big Al’s fate. They must keep two sets of books. One set, that could be made public, would show “honest income” from a...

“Apres moi le deluge” Louis XV If accounting standards were peasants with pitchforks, then this quote from the last King of France to die with a head on his shoulders might well describe what lies before us. Because history may remember 2013 as the last year that public entities could hide their debts and deceive...

This week both of California’s largest government employee pension funds, CalPERS and CalSTRS, released their portfolio earnings numbers for the most recent twelve months. In a statement released on January 24th, “CalSTRS Calendar Year-End Investment Returns Show Slight Gains,” CalSTRS disclosed “Investment returns for the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) ended the 2011 calendar...