PERA to see big changes - if legislature approves - Fort Morgan...

Public Employees Retirement Association members may have to deal with rising costs and lower benefits - which is now up to the Colorado legislature.

[bernard c kinnick]

changing cost of living adjustment for current retirees from 3 1/2% to 2% comes as ok, as we all have to contribute to the funds soundness but offering current retirees 0-2% adjustment is not fair.
5409

[Not a pretty picture]

What is not fair is the impact this will have on those who have 1-6 years to retire. Raising the age to 60 means some people, who have carefully planned to retire in the next five years, will have to work up to 14 more years. Why should retirees collect a 3.5% raise when those who are not retired are experiencing wage freezes? The fact that PERA allowed itself to be in this situation will hurt all of it's members.

[PERA Retiree]

The recommendations made by the PERA Board of Trustees were definitely in the taxpayers interest. However, please be aware that over the next 30 years current and future PERA retirees will be at an extreme disadvantage compared to Social Security recipients, as seen in the following SSA web page which compiles COLAs from 1975 through 2009: http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/COLA/colaseries.html

If you look retrospectively over the last 30 year period (1980-2009), the Social Security COLA ranges from 0.0%(2009) to 14.3%(1980). The average of the 30 years of COLAs is 3.8%. Indeed, there were 3 years when the COLA was less than 2.0%: 1986 (1.3%), 1998 (1.3%), 2002 (1.4%). Please note that the SSA COLA is based on the CPI-W inflation index with no upper cap.

The proposed PERA COLA will be capped at 2.0% or the CPI-W index, whatever is less. This is about half the Social Security COLA of 3.8% for the previous 30 years. If you were to look at the entire 35 year history of Social Security COLAs (1975-2009), the 35 year COLA average was 4.3%, which is even higher than the 30 year average (1980-2009) of 3.8%.

From another perspective, consider two workers who plan to retire in 2010. They both have $1,000 per month benefits. However, one retiree is a SSA recipient with a 3.8% COLA, while the other retiree is a PERA beneficiary with a COLA of 2.0%. After 10 years, the SSA retiree receives $1,451.96 and the PERA retiree receives $1,218.97. After 20 years, the SSA retiree receives $2,065.95 and the PERA retiree receives $1,485.86. After 30 years, the SSA retiree receives $2,914.15 and the PERA retiree receives $1,811.19. This time frame is not far fetched, as most retire between 55 and 64 and will need adequate retirement income for 30 or more years. For the sake of fairness, or intergenerational equity, surely PERA retirees deserve equity with SSA recipients in terms of COLA. Alas, many people are not aware that most PERA retirees receive nothing from Social Security.

The 3.5% increase that PERA beneficiaries have been receiving was just an attempt to put them on par with Social Security recipients, not to provide a "golden parachute". Is this too much to ask?! The public employee PERA benefit is supposed to be the combined equivalent of Soc Sec plus a 401k Plan.

[TaxedtodeathinFl orida]

Hard to believe how greedy you gov workers are. You expect your children and grandchildren to pay for your retirements, it's a joke. The don't deserve to be screwed over like they are being, just so gov workers can retire early. It's time to get everyone on SS and get rid of pensions and health care after retiring, how about paying for your own retirements. Stop stealing from your children! It's time you gov and union workers grow up and pay for your own retirements.

[Fair Pensions]

Big changes??? Peanuts!!!
This is a nice start but the changes recommended are peanuts. Most private sector workers will never have a fraction of these benefits.
Why not have at least a 50/50 split on the cost of the benefits?
http://www.pensiontsunami.com/

[Almosthere]

State workers pay for their own retirement, do people realize that our retirement is based on a percentage taking out of our checks monthly. (yes we get paid monthly) I think it is at 8% right now, I could be wrong. But we provide our own retirement thru PERA, PERA takes the 8% and holds it until your retirement date or you leave state service (which at that time you can either withdraw your 8% and reinvest or withdraw and pay taxes on amount withdrawn. This retirement fund is not funded by our children and/or grandchildren.