Public Safety Employees & Retirement Age
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- Public Safety Employees & Retirement Age
- What do you think a fair & sustainable retirement benefit looks like?
- Should the responsibility for negotiating pension benefits reside with the unit of government responsible for paying the benefits?
- What are you thoughts on Chicago’s Pension Reform Legislation (SB 1922)?
- Do you think Cook County should cap pensions at $106,000? Even for Doctors?
No sworn correctional staff should be allowed to work after 60. The job is just to stressful.
Workers should be allowed to work as long as they are physically capable of performing. While I don’t understand the issues of a correctional worker, driving an 18-wheel truck down a highway has to be stressful as is being a roofer or a bricklayer. Every job has its own demands.
The question is when should retirement benefits be paid? As longevity increases, defined pension become a significant cost. As GM, United and now the Federal Government have found, they can be unsustainable. Next year we will be talking about cutting Social Security benefits and increasing the retirement age for young workers.
All workers should have the nominal benefits of Social Security and then the surplus of whatever they can save for retirement. The age they retire, should be up to the worker.
Unfortunately, the system today has allowed politicians and powerful unions to negotiate benefits and not fund them. This has left the system with a significant funding and earnings deficit that will be passed on to our children. That is unfair.
Politicians should not be guaranteeing pensions for their public servants that they are not willing to fund currently and workers should not expect their children to fund any shortfall.
Early retirement for Sheriff’s employees is modeled after police officers – the work of police officers is a lot harder than court deputies and correctional officers.
Also, police only got early retirement because they imitated the military – and they military has early retirement because the US had too many soldiers after WWI, and needed to get them to retire.
There’s no good justification for early retirement for sworn personnel.