The Working File

Mayor Bloomberg has an opinion article in today’s Daily News offering a rather weak reform of NYC public employee pensions:

Pensions. New York City offers full retirement benefits after only 20 years of service for uniformed workers. In this day and age, with people living longer, taxpayers cannot afford to continue hiring workers who will be able to collect full retirement benefits in their early 40s.

We will honor pension obligations to all current workers and retirees. But for future hires, it is time to begin bringing the system in line with reality. Our proposal, which Gov. Paterson included in his executive budget, would require employees to make contributions to their retirement fund throughout their careers, as nearly all private sector workers do. We would also create a minimum retirement age for future hires, which we would set at age 50 for uniformed workers. Teachers would continue to be able to retire at age 55, and other civilians at age 57.

This will be bitterly opposed in the New York legislature and by public employee unions. The Daily News has a companion editorial on Staten Island state Sen. Diane Savino who is exposed as a public employee union lackey on pension issues.

Yet despite this inevitable opposition, this is an incredibly weak reform. It still allows public employees to retire in their early to mid-50s, including new hires. Why shouldn’t public employees be required to work until they are 65 like everyone else. This is preposterous. I don’t blame Bloomberg here — he is trying to do what is possible (although I do blame him for not pounding on this issue for the first several years of his administration). The sad thing is I’m not optimistic that even this is possible.