Public Sector Pensions: The Real Bailout Bomb is Still Midflight

Will the madness ever stop?  Just over two weeks ago, Congress passed a $10 billion “Education Jobs Fund” that gave money to cash-strapped states to keep teachers and other school employees on the job.  It was spun as a victory for the kids, but the real winners were the teacher unions who were spared from making any concessions on pay and benefits that are necessary to balancing school budgets.

Once that $10 billion is spent, the structural problems of school spending will still remain.  A recent study from the Manhattan Institute and the Foundation for Educational Choice finds that “teacher pension liabilities for all 50 states now total almost $1 trillion….almost triple the cost of what state officials have on their balance sheets.”  The study concludes that these unfunded public burdens “could bankrupt state budgets including education programs.”

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