News

The Sacramento Bee’s State Worker blog covers the Center’s new workforce survey. (5/16/13)

Forty-four percent of state and local governments made pension plan changes over a 12-month period, up from 37% in the previous 12 months, according to an annual survey released Wednesday by the Center for State and Local Government Excellence. (5/15/13)

From the Bankrate.com Retirement Blog: The fiscal stability of state and local government pensions has been the source of much retirement planning consternation, but the recent Future of Retirement summit, sponsored by the Center for State and Local Government Excellence, was upbeat about the issue. (4/29/13)

Center Vice President of Research Joshua Franzel tells Governing that because it’s easier for governments to change or eliminate retiree health care benefits, governments are shifting more costs to retirees. (4/22/13)

MarketWatch covers the Center’s Future of Retirement Summit. (4/19/13)

Although there has been no general trend toward shifting employees to a defined contribution plan as the primary retirement benefit, some states are beginning to look at defined contribution plans as a primary offering for certain employee groups. (4/12/13)

In 2009, in the wake of the economic downturn, states increased their efforts to address the sustainability of their public pension systems. Since then, nearly every state legislature has passed reforms to various elements of their public pension systems, with most reducing benefits and/or requiring greater employee contributions. The coming year should see significant activity in several states as well. (2/28/13)

As the federal government debates the continuation of the payroll tax cut and postpones the critical debate over the long term financing of Social Security, what might it learn from state and local government pension management? Center for State and Local Government Excellence President & CEO Elizabeth Kellar writes about the consequences of pension holidays and why some pension plans are better funded than others. (2/8/12)

Center researcher Alex Brown reviews the impact of reforms made by the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System in the Statesman Journal. (1/14/12)

Fear mongering about bankruptcy and defaults is costly and hurts the economic recovery, writes Center President & CEO Elizabeth Kellar. (2/8/11)