NCPERS News Clips

2/16/2010

News Clips for February 16, 2010

NCPERS wishes to thank our Legislative Conference registrants, speakers , and other participants for being so understanding and accommodating to the forced cancellation of the Legislative Conference due to the winter Blizzards of 2010. Refunds to registered attendees will be processed in the coming weeks. We look forward to seeing you at our Annual Conference & Exhibition in sunny Las Vegas, NV. Please click here for more information!

• Towers Watson Finds DB Plans Outperformed DC Plans
  A Towers Watson news release said DB plans outperformed 401(k) plans by roughly 1 percentage point in 2008, although both types of plans lost value, and while most DB plans incurred losses for 2008, some actually reported small positive returns. By contrast, all DC plans in the study had losses of at least 10%, and a few had losses greater than 40%, more than any DB plan in the study, according to the news release.
• N.J. state pension and benefits reforms move forward
  New Jersey Senate leaders Tuesday announced that bipartisan legislation to complete the unfinished business of what they describe as reforming the state's public employee pension and benefits system that begun nearly four years ago was formally introduced Monday night in the upper house.
• To cut pensions is to break a promise
  (Laurie) Valentin claims that the deficits in the public pension funds are not caused by the economy or the tanking of the stock markets, but "occurred primarily for one reason: The size of the paychecks issued -- specifically the benefit (pay) increases in them." This is simply not true.
• Gap for Calif. retiree health care grows to $52B
  The state controller's office on Tuesday found that California taxpayers are on the hook for more state government retiree health benefits than previously thought.
• San Jose council votes to put experts on pension boards
  Facing crushing deficits driven in part by soaring retirement costs, the San Jose City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to replace most pension trustees with outside financial experts.
• CHP union exec: lower pensions for new hires?
  A new bill backed by CalPERS and CalSTRS makes a second attempt to tighten control of placement agents, the middlemen who collect multi-million dollar fees for helping investment firms get pension fund money.
• Fix sought for Minnesota teacher pension fund
  The board that oversees pensions for teachers and administrators is asking legislators to increase employee and employer contributions and reduce annual increases for retirees.
• Defined benefit plan offers best chance of a secure retirement: Ask the Expert
  A defined benefit pension plan is obligated to provide you the promised benefits, no matter what the investment world has done in the meantime.