GregsOpinion.com

Kevin states his opposition to the Houston pension ballot now ongoing. A fairly damning vote in that a) Kevin's done yeoman's work in detailing a lot of the particulars from his layman's perspective and b) allegedly, he's still a Republican - one supposes that there's a genetic predisposition towards ratcheting down public pension benefits that goes along with that. I, on the other hand, intend to vote yes - to opt out of the pension guarantee. Given my own ranking as a Democrat - one supposes that there's a genetic predisposition towards awarding AFSCME any demands asked for - that places this vote seemingly in the twighlight zone. Conservative types supporting massive pension guarantees juxtaposed with whatever the heck I'm supposed to be pigeonholed as supporting what one presumes to be cuts in retirement benefits. Who woulda thunk it?

To be fair, the split seems to be a bit more nuanced than normal political guidelines dictate. Kevin notes that the sense of urgency has not met his degree of satisfaction and he's also previously pointed out that those claiming ignorance to the effects of the pension plan, pre-enactment, aren't as innocent as they claim to be. As for myself, I tend to agree wholeheartedly with the latter point, in no small part due to Kevin's own research shedding a lot of light on this topic. The first point, however, I tend to disagree with, nevermind that the objection contains a fair amount of subjectivity with it. The urgency, I would argue, comes from two elements - that there is a date-certain by which we must either opt out of be locked in, and that the increases this would lead to the city budget certainly stand out as dire warnings of things to come. The first of those points is rather concrete, barring another state constitutional amendment. The second one, admittedly, has its own degree of subjectivity included, but I'm of the opinion that the dollar amounts don't look good any way you view them.

Stepping back a bit, the difference might best come down to the following: do we honor our promise, or do we negotiate the best deal we can at any given point in time? There's certainly a point to be made about honoring a fiduciary committment. But once it approaches a point where you cannot meet that committment without significantly altering the status quo, I'd argue there's a line there somewhere that has to be crossed. Case in point ... you buy a car based on how much you can afford for payments and upkeep. If you lose a job within a month of purchasing the car, however, you might have to rethink that purchase. If you realize you've gotten something that wasn't as advertised, likewise, you might want to reconsider.

What is truly troublesome to me, is how any pension benefit plan can be devised that doesn't seem to balance out three things: employee contributions, employer contributions, and likely investment returns. The primary exception to this rule, as we know, is Social Security. There's a reason for that, though, and the two words: "social" and "security" tend to sum it up best. An employee pension plan, whether public or private, should be viewed as a complement to that income (when both kick in), not a lifetime continuation of pay irregardless of various contributions and investment returns. We've already got examples to witness to see how pension plans can tie the hands of private companies, other counties, and other cities. That problems persist (full disclosure: my father recently lost out on his entire private pension from an employer who terminated it due to bankruptcy) do not necessarily mean that we need to back out of every single committment on pensions. In the case of Houston's own pension mess, there will always be the need for those responsible for knowing what they're signing off on. Unfortunately, in that case, I don't think that happened. And with that ...

I'll be voting Yes in the election.