Brother can you spare a dime? Or perhaps $200 million?

If you had the chance to invest $200 million of your pension trust fund into a quasi-public economic development agency, would you do it?  What if that agency had a proven track record of epic levels of mismanagement, including losing track of a $56 million loan portfolio?  Of course not.  Thankfully, neither did the State of Wisconsin Investment Board.

Documents obtained by Wisconsin Reporter show that Reed Hall, CEO of Walker’s Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation, recommended that the SWIB loan $200 million to theWEDC. 

"Walker serves as chairman of the WEDC board of directors.  Hall said WEDC would use SWIB’s cash to promote business growth through taxpayer-subsidized government investments in Wisconsin companies.  In a letter to SWIB, Hall explained that he was turning to the pension fund because his start-up program would likely find it harder to tap private investors “due to a lack of demonstrable track records.”

Oh, there's plenty of demonstrable track record at the WEDC.  The problem for them is that it demonstrates rank incompetence at nearly every level.  The problems with the WEDC are myriad and have been covered here before.  Hall certainly has a challenge ahead.  How do you convince private investors to invest their money in an agency that has demonstrated nothing but failure, whose funds will be run by largely first-time fund managers, in a state that has failed miserably at attracting economic development?  Well, you don't.  If you could, Hall wouldn't be hitting up the SWIB for a fix from the pension fund.  These people need to take some personal responsibility and stop looking for a handout.  Isn't it about time the takers stopped begging from the makers?

Dr. Tim's Comedy Tour

local "tea party" speaker and comedian, Dr, Tim Nerenz, is at it again.  Earlier this year, he had a routine where he completely misconstrued and lied about the protests and the recalls.   While his blog is one of the funniest around(although I am not sure that comedy is what he is shooting for), he occasionally comes up with some that stand out.

He did it again. This time trying to attack the Wisconsin Pension system.  

If government securities will return only 3%, then corporate investments must return 10, 12 or even 15% to bring the average returns up to the 7% needed to pay out their pension liabilities.  The YTD return on the S&P 500 is only 7.6%, so corporate profits must roughly double in order to rescue the public pension systems.  

That cracks the room up! 

As Capper shared with us, the Wisconsin Pensions System is strong but the righties still want to get their hands on it! 

But the sad fact is that it's not only the public sector workers' money that would go to feed the monsters of Wall Street, but the taxpayers' money as well. After all, defined benefits plans like the one the state has right now is almost twice as cost effective as the defined contribution plans they want to force on us.

 The reality is that no matter what the Dr. Tim's of the state or the Magyver Institute tries to throw at us, they are lying to you and their one goal is to cash in on YOUR pension system, not to save it!   The Wisconsin Pension system is doing just great without their help! 

A highly anticipated report ordered by Gov. Scott Walker and the Republican-controlled Legislature and released on Monday recommended no changes to Wisconsin’s $77 billion pension system.

But the report’s findings that Wisconsin’s system is strong and should not be changed are not a surprise, Holden said.

“This is a very well-managed system, and I think the report came to that judgment with very good data,” she said.

The report, written by the Department of Administration, the Department of Employee Trust Funds and the Office of State Employment Relations, cited numerous problems that could occur if the state instigated changes.

Defined contribution plans, like a 401(k), are common in private businesses and have no guaranteed payout to retirees. Benefits are guaranteed to workers in a defined benefit plan, as Wisconsin offers its employees. While a defined contribution plan would provide no risk to taxpayers, the report said the professional management of all pooled assets under the current system increases the performance of the defined benefit plan.

Employers and employees would have to pay more to get the same level of benefit they have now if the state would move to a defined contribution system, the report said. It also said such plans typically have higher administrative costs.

The study also raised concerns about allowing workers to opt out of making required payments to the system. Doing that could negatively affect contribution rates for those already in the system and present tax qualification issues with the Internal Revenue Service for the current plan, the report said.

So we see with the report that was written by the Governor's own departments that the best thing to do with our pension system is to leave it alone.   We all know that will not stop Dr. Tim and the rest of the red meaters, from trying to write and talk about how we must change it!   

You can not blame them though, Dr. Tim, Brian Fraley, Christian Schneider , Jimmy Wigderson, are all just political hacks who are unemployable in the real world.  Their best bet is to keep doing, writing and saying what they are told by their corporate masters so they can continue to collect the paychecks. 

 

Of course if college was affordable, maybe they could go back and get an education and realize how silly they actually are!