In general, research and news articles on public employee pensions have focused on state systems. Why? Because there are only 50 of them. But the separate NYC pension system is larger than that of most states, and more troubled than all but a few of them, even though NYC taxpayers have contributed more to those pension funds that those living just about anywhere else. Because the state legislature has granted richer and richer pensions to NYC public employees, the richest of whom live outside the city. It seems that some researchers, having finished with the states, have moved onto the cities, and one finds that NYC's pension funds will run out of money in 2021.
But that's not a problem for anyone that matters. The rich will continue to get around in black cars and send their kids to private schools, donating to their own "public" parks if they want them. The public employees will live in the suburbs, before taking their tax-free pensions to Florida, drive everywhere and park for free with their placards. The pensions are guaranteed by the New York State Constitution, and the senior citizens in the New York State Legislature and Congress will make sure today's senior citizens make absolutely no sacrifices. Only the serfs and younger generations will lose, as public services and benefits face an institutional collapse.
Quick, let's change the subject to gay marriage, abortion, guns, sugar soda, bike lanes, whatever.
The question is, do younger generations have any moral obligations to the debts older generations have run up and the retirement benefits they have promised themselves, but (to preserve those promises) take away from those following? The answer is no — unless those already retired, and soon to retire, share in the enormous sacrifices required to turn around the situation.
I keep waiting for someone in a leadership position to talk openly about the inequities of what has been done. But it never happens. Because those in leadership positions continue to get there by pandering to Generation Greed. So the remaining alternative is war against the government, which will no longer meet people’s needs unless they were born before 1956. As those who were too apathetic to prevent the institutional collapse simply refuse to pay.