It isn't appropriate to handle the groups involved in cultural disputes by the dynamics of individuals.
Children need fathers, and lesbians need sperm donors. These facts are not unrelated.
Ratings agencies aren't grading the government on the job that it's doing, but on its ability to confiscate wealth to pay debtors.
A 0.75% or so increase in pay every year above what otherwise would have been given will completely undo any savings in lifetime pay and pension that the people of Rhode Island gained by implementing a hybrid pension system.
An NEARI poll has Robitaille beating Chafee and Raimondo for governor, but it appears to be all three at once, so I'm not sure how much it really tells us.
I've responded to a response from Ted Nesi to my post on pension-reform credulity.
Perhaps some of the credulity with which Rhode Islanders are accepting the pension reform narrative has to do with a desire to believe that their vision of government can work.
Meanwhile, in Tiverton, a Town Council that looked likely to stand firm in union negotiations is not performing as expected.
The last-minute 5.5% privatization tax slipped into the pension reform bill may prove more insidious than it at first appears.
I've elaborated, a bit, on why I find enthusiasm for the just-passed pension reform so misplaced.
We're in a cycle of decline, and it would be better to reform peacefully now than to collapse or revolt later.
Advocates for the pension reform currently before the RI General Assembly sound like the Obama cultists of 2008.
ABC6 has posted video of the news story in which I appeared, last week, about pensioners who make more than they did as employees.
Today, on the Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity blog, I've reviewed pensioners with very low pensions as well as those who receive more than one pension from plans administered by the state.
I've taken a look at the public entities with the youngest retirees, as well as the wealthiest.
The RI Treasurer's pension reform is an exercise in leading by following and fixing problems by putting them off.
The modern zeitgeist doesn't seem to make distinctions between progress in various areas of society, even when they're at odds.
I've added some different cuts of the data concerning RI public-sector pensioners who make more in pension than they did in pay. The most significant takeaway is that COLAs alone don't account for the phenomenon; the top 50 pensioners making more than their salaries have base pensions (not counting COLAs) that are 95% of their salaries.
I'll be on the 5:00 and 6:00 evening news broadcasts on ABC6 talking about my analysis of public pensions that are higher than the salaries from which they grew.
Tiverton politics illustrate the dishonest "Rhode Island Way" and highlight the way out.
Campaign contributions to RI's general treasurer shouldn't be taken as a sign of her moral worth.
I've taken a closer look at the phenomenon of retirees with pensions larger than their former paychecks, and the reasonable scenario of gradual increases doesn't appear to apply. For one thing, older retirees appear much less likely to have pensions that exceed their final salaries than retirees who've been off the job for just a few years. For another, the entity for which the retiree worked appears to make a significant difference.
In-state tuition for illegal immigrants undermines respect for the rule of law.
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