The entire purpose of Government is providing services to its citizens. We can quibble or argue over what services and in what quantity but they must be paid for. It is becoming increasingly clear that services must be paid for in the now but that past services are ALSO being paid for now and in the future. Which as many towns, cities and States are coming to grips that those past services are very expensive indeed. Especially out in California, services for the present are being drastically in many places due to the high price, via pensions, of those past services.
And now Nashua is feeling the price of former politicians giving too much to former government employees as they are seeing the cost of kicking that can down the road – only a snippet from the Telegraph (pay wall):
NASHUA – With the city facing a likely budget crunch in fiscal 2017-18, caused in large part by increasing pension costs, lifting the spending cap is seen as an unlikely way out of trouble.
The city’s spending cap can be lifted with a vote of 10 of the 15 members of the Board of Aldermen. That figure is out of reach given the current makeup of the board, said Brian McCarthy, president of the board…
Back to California, from Reason.com:
If public service truly is a sacrifice, then join me in shedding a tear for the 20,900 public workers in California who pulled down more than $100,000 in retirement benefits during 2015.
How many in Nashua are in that same stratospheric retirement club? Remember, the median wage in the US is only $32,000 per year.
Nashua is finding out the hard way that continuing a retirement system that is 70, 80 years old isn’t going to work. And it is only going to get worse. Not only is it harder for citizens, in this economy, to pay for their own retirements but are going to receive less in services (even with higher taxes) to fund all those public retirements.
Nationally, this is unsustainable as promises were given that politicians KNEW could not be kept down the road. The piper has piped and the Fat Lady is warming up – what are today’s politicians going to do as that tin can has morphed into building sized lead ball.
Their little toesies are going to really hurt trying to kick that. And then they’ll find out that public service is no longer a sacrifice when compared to the private sector. Absolutely not.
