Updates to faculty layoff plan and other stuff

General Campus News, Updates, Discussion
rocki
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wiu712 wrote: Tue Jul 31, 2018 9:00 am From Jim Nowlan's column in today's Peoria Journal-Star:

"Public higher education is a shambles. Several century-old public campuses appear to be dying."

Jim Nowlan is a former legislator and senior fellow at the University of Illinois’ Institute of Government and Public Affairs. He lives in Toulon.
I had this guy for an American History class back in the day. I also notice he's a "former legislator" - how much did his votes in the past contribute to the woes of IL and its' penchant for spending money we don't have? I don't have much faith in "former legislators", as they're the ones who put us where we are today.
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Tere North
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wiu712 wrote: Tue Jul 31, 2018 9:00 am From Jim Nowlan's column in today's Peoria Journal-Star:

"Public higher education is a shambles. Several century-old public campuses appear to be dying."

Jim Nowlan is a former legislator and senior fellow at the University of Illinois’ Institute of Government and Public Affairs. He lives in Toulon.
Here's the link to the article http://www.pjstar.com/opinion/20180730/ ... ttle-plans
wiu712
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A Breakdown: 62 Positions Slated for Elimination at WIU.

From Tri-States Public Radio, WIUM-FM:
http://www.tspr.org/post/breakdown-62-p ... nation-wiu
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Neckerchief
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From Jim Nowlan's column in today's Peoria Journal-Star:
The gargantuan public employee pension funding shortfall at the state and local levels, decades in the making, is overwhelming the state fiscally and badly needs fresh thinking.
This is the root of our problems, including the budget standoff. Illinois cannot balance a budget and cover pensions payments at the same time. This will not end well.
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Tere North
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Neckerchief wrote: Tue Jul 31, 2018 6:03 pm From Jim Nowlan's column in today's Peoria Journal-Star:
The gargantuan public employee pension funding shortfall at the state and local levels, decades in the making, is overwhelming the state fiscally and badly needs fresh thinking.
This is the root of our problems, including the budget standoff. Illinois cannot balance a budget and cover pensions payments at the same time. This will not end well.
Had the State not continuously taken pension holidays and spent that supposedly dedicated money on special projects, there wouldn't be pension shortfall problem.
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Neckerchief
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The Wall Street Journal discussed underfunded pensions in a July 30th article (behind a paywall):

The Pension Hole for U.S. Cities and States Is the Size of Germany’s Economy
Many retirement funds could face insolvency unless governments increase taxes, divert funds or persuade workers to relinquish money they are owed

A key takeaway from the article gives a sobering warning that pension benefits can, and HAVE, been cut:
In Kentucky, a major pension plan covering state employees had about 16% of what it needs to fulfill earlier promises, according to the Public Plans Database, which tracks state and local pension funds, based on 2017 fiscal year figures. A fund covering Chicago municipal employees had less than 30% of what it needed in that fiscal year, according to the same database. New Jersey’s pension system for state workers is so underfunded it could run out of money in 12 years, according to a Pew Charitable Trusts study.

When the math no longer works the result is Central Falls, R.I., a city of 19,359. Today, retired police and firefighters are wrestling with the consequences of agreeing to cut their monthly pension checks by as much as 55% when the town was working to escape insolvency. The fiscal situation of the city, which filed for bankruptcy in 2011, has improved, but the retirees aren’t getting their full pensions back.
Anyone who has their entire retirement with the state of Illinois should be putting as much money as possible into savings (such as an IRA) to protect against a possible cut in benefits in the future.
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sealhall74
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The only pension plan that makes sense is one with gradually DIMINISHING benefits as one gets well into the golden years. However, for this to work, we also would need a massive overhaul of the health care system to get costs back into the REASONABLE category. Face reality, you no longer need to live like a king when just getting out of bed every day is your goal in life.
Embrace the pace of the race.
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ST_Lawson
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Neckerchief wrote: Wed Aug 01, 2018 10:33 pm A key takeaway from the article gives a sobering warning that pension benefits can, and HAVE, been cut:

Anyone who has their entire retirement with the state of Illinois should be putting as much money as possible into savings (such as an IRA) to protect against a possible cut in benefits in the future.
It's not really as simple as just cutting benefits though. As it currently stands, courts have said that they legally can't cut pension benefits, so they'd have to change the state constitution to be able to do it.

I'm not opposed to some cuts to the pensions, although if they do it, I'd like to see them start with capping the maximum amount that people can receive. Whenever people talk about the pension problem, it seems like they roll out numbers on some people receiving well into 6-figures a year. Fine...cap it at like $100k or $120k per year or something. That should be more than enough for most people to live off of very comfortably. If they were making enough to have a $150k+ pension in the first place, then they should have other investments as well that they can rely on to boost their retirement income. I know that won't fix things, but it's a start, and I think it's one that many people on both sides of the aisle can get on board with. Pensions shouldn't be subsidizing bi-annual trips to Europe or buying vacation homes, that's what the additional investments should be for if you want to go that route, but it should cover enough that the person can live comfortably and not have to worry about being able to eat, get adequate healthcare, or have a place to live.

The way I'm treating it when it comes to my and my wife's retirement plan is that we'll be ok financially if we have no pension whatsoever, just won't get to travel or do as much as we'd wanted. If we do have at least half of what we're "supposed" to get based on the current setup, then we should be able to do what we want to do in that aspect. Everyone should diversify retirement savings...if we learned only one thing from Enron, it's to not have all your "eggs in one basket".
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wiu712
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"Pension Holidays" were used by Governors of both parties. Those years of not funding the State pension obligations are now coming home to roost.

Cities can file bankruptcy, but states cannot.

Any current State of Illinois employee (those paying into TRS, SURS, SERS) should be working on a goal to fully-fund their State Deferred Compensation Program (403b or 457). Once that is done, any extra set-aside money should be going into a Roth IRA.

Most SERS retirees will get Social Security. Most TRS and SURS will not.
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ST_Lawson
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wiu712 wrote: Thu Aug 02, 2018 11:54 am "Pension Holidays" were used by Governors of both parties. Those years of not funding the State pension obligations are now coming home to roost.

Cities can file bankruptcy, but states cannot.

Any current State of Illinois employee (those paying into TRS, SURS, SERS) should be working on a goal to fully-fund their State Deferred Compensation Program (403b or 457). Once that is done, any extra set-aside money should be going into a Roth IRA.

Most SERS retirees will get Social Security. Most TRS and SURS will not.
Yeah, there's lots of blame to go around for it. The state didn't fund it like it should, and now they're so far behind that it's nearly impossible to catch up. They're going to have to hit it from multiple angles if they want to fix things.

Depending on your financial situation, it may be more beneficial to forego the 403b and put everything that you would put into that into a Roth IRA. We had been doing our 403b through the university, but after doing some research, decided to switch over to a Roth IRA instead. Really the only difference is that with the 403b, you're taxed when the money comes out, but on the Roth IRA, you're taxed when the money goes in. Personally, I'm in a position where the taxes right now are not that big of a hit for us and to be able to know that we can take that money out without having to deal with paying taxes on it once we're retired is nice. Neither my wife nor I will be receiving any Social Security unless something drastic changes in our work situation.
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