We're in trouble due to overspending on entitlement programs
Q: Why do you think America got itself into such a terrible mess economically? What do you think was the problem?
A: Greed. And because no one wanted to tell anybody the truth. The truth was you can't continue to spend the kind of money our spending on all these entitlement programs.
I think we need more people in public life who are willing to say no, we can't afford certain things, no we can't do certain things, we've got to wind up being honest with people.
I think we got ourselves in this mess because some people in the financial industry became incredibly short-sighted and greedy and we had government officials who refused to say no.
Source: Interview on CNN "Piers Morgan Tonight"
, Jun 15, 2011
Raise the retirement age, and limit COLA, for state workers
We must tackle this year is our antiquated and unsustainable pension and benefit system.
Without reform, pension and health care benefit costs will increase by more than 40% over the next four years.
Without reform, the unfunded liability wil
grow, from $54 billion today to a staggering $183 billion within 30 years.
Without reform, the required annual pension contribution by the state will grow to over $13 billion annually over that same time period.
Without reform, the beneficiaries
of the system face a high risk of catastrophe which would place ALL of their benefits at risk.
We must modestly raise the retirement age in an era of longer life expectancy. We must curb the effect of COLAs in a time of low or no inflation. And we
must ensure a modest but acceptable contribution from employees toward their own retirement system. Without reform, the problem we face is simple: Benefits are too rich, and contributions are too small, and the system is on a path to bankruptcy.
