Public school pension funds in California are in a $64 billion deficit according to a study done by The California Teacher’s Retirement System (Cal STRS). This study was conducted in response to Governor Jerry Brown’s new budget plan. The STRS gets most of its money from investment earnings as well as taxes from schools and teachers. With a bad recession, the STRS was hit hard and cannot get back on its feet as it falls deeper in deficit.
As bad as that may seem, to make things worse pension fund managers are turning these pension funds into hedge funds and gambling them on the market. This only harms the hard working teachers and Wall Street wins. The working people approve none of these investments while the managers are taking higher risks with their retirement money even though they promise bigger returns. Investing is always a gamble. Wall Street is using the money in these pension funds to get themselves rich while hurting and not taking responsibility to the working class.
Danny Weil, “Financial Capitalism and the US teachers’ pension fund fraud,” Daily Censored, February 11, 2013. http://www.dailycensored.com/financial-capitalism-and-the-us-teachers-pension-fund-fraud/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Dailycensored+%28Daily+Censored%29
Student Researcher: Andrew Brown, College of Marin
Faculty Evaluator: Susan Rahman, College of Marin