“The six-year bull market is admittedly long in the tooth.” CalSTRS Chief Investment Officer Chris Ailman, Sacramento Bee, July 17, 2015 If what Mr. Ailman really means is equity investments may not be turning in double digit returns any more, that makes the recent performance of CalSTRS and CalPERS all the more troubling. Because according...

Thanks to Proposition 30 with its retroactive tax increase and an improving economy, the state claims that it has balanced its General Fund budget.  This may be technically correct but ignores some very unpleasant realities. Claiming to have balanced the budget ignores the growing unfunded liabilities associated with public employee pensions and other unfunded retirement...

“What a salesman,” he said, mockingly. “I guess that’s what you learned … selling that stock that went south.” – California Governor Brown, to challenger Kashkari, during televised debate Sept. 4th, 2014 (ref. SF Gate) If anyone wants to know what the theme of Governor Brown’s attacks on GOP candidate Neel Kashkari is going to...

A new union-sponsored study lowballs today’s pension costs by around two-thirds and overstates the net costs of corporate welfare. The Washington Post’s Lydia DePillis recently reported on a new union-sponsored study from Good Jobs First that claims that corporate welfare payments from state governments dwarf the costs of public employee pensions. To begin, we shouldn’t take this corporate welfare/public...