[quote=flu]
… you sure spend a lot of time on blogs writing a lot about just how “independent thinking” you are, and you sure spend a lot of time trying to convince others exactly how “independent thinking” you are. Now why is that?
[/quote]
lot’s of time writing… not really
I’m a voracious reader w/ a good memory and my laptop is setup to scan media for stuff I find interesting and potentially useful like economic news which can be applied to managing my own money (i.e. “investing”)
its therefore easy to just “cut, copy, and paste” text to form a coherent picture and top it w/ a few words of personal observations that some might find entertaining/thought-provoking
besides as harvey mentioned it would be boring to post just another humblebrag about a 4th home in Hawaii, schemes that earn double digit returns in the current economic environment, a huge (pronounced “HUUUUGE” or “UGE” or “YUGE” depending upon trump’s mood) RE and stock portfolio structured to be tax efficient, etc. etc. etc.
(analysis and conclusions based on prior “posts”)
[quote=phaster]
August 11, 2016 – 7:33pm
[SNIP]
actually given “frequency” of posts on this site you share much more in common w/ BG than I do, given you two seem to be more regular, regulars (i.e. very active long term users)… and IMHO FWIW the posts contain lots of “noise” and very little “signal”; on the other hand I just drop in every once in a while to see what piggs mostly think about the economy and try to contribute insights supported by data that others might have missed (SEE existing website slogan at bottom of page,… In God we trust. Everyone Else Bring Data!)
[SNIP]
[/quote]
[quote=phaster]
September 11, 2016 – 8:43pm
[SNIP]
WRT the other post(s)…
[quote=flu]Phaster, lay off the monthly dope and booze binge.
I guess now that the Peak Oil conspiracy has been busted, it’s time to move onto the next conspiracy. Bonds and pensions.
Hope you didn’t go long on oil when it was Peak Prices… Lol.
Let me know when your next revelation will be the next time you’re high. Entertainment factor, of course.[/quote]
[quote=flu]I just think it’s funny that for some reason, some people are so fixated on one particular issue to the point of an obsession. I mean, what’s up with the axe grinding on municipalities and public pensions?
I mean, there were so many nutjobs that were talking about peak oil. I filled up my 20 gallon SUV over at costco yesterday. Cost me $50, down from $85 I think. Track rat miata cost $24 to fill up, getting 18 miles/gallon (lol)..Synthetic motor oil fell from $35 to $20 for 5 quarts.
So much for peak oil…Lol.[/quote]
[quote=flu]Meh, if there’s a voting system, then I’ll be the one trying to get the most negative votes. It means I’m doing a good job pissing people off. heh heh.[/quote]
next revelation is,… if there were a voting system I might win that most unpopular race because I inadvertently have honed a natural fact based zinger style and can on occasion deliver a message w/ kinda a “trump” like belittlement attitude when I see errors taken as gospel
upon reflection my excuse for a proclivity of using fact based zingers is caused by formidable years spent sitting through various theology (parochial school) and physics (university) lectures and trying to reconcile the two schools of thought, which admittedly in practice makes for unique analysis given each discipline has at its basis diametrically opposed ways of analyzing issues (i.e. belief vs logic)
whats your excuse? your head naturally located where the sun don’t shine and the fumes disrupting cognitive abilities so you revert back to middle school behavior like taunting and name calling??
PS since you mentioned “pensions” in your juvenile taunts, perhaps you might dismiss the news which indicates the local pension debt just spiked as just another part of a delusion I somehow fabricated to support some kind of conspiracy theory
[quote=sandiegouniontribune.com] San Diego facing new pension debt
SAN DIEGO — A recent $380 million spike in San Diego’s pension debt is forcing city officials to debate whether to begin paying that bill now or take the controversial step of pushing the financial pain several years down the road.
…The spike, which is the result of a new actuarial study showing that city employees and retirees are living significantly longer, would increase the city’s annual pension payment — $261 million this year — by $35 million, or more than 13 percent.
That increase would help the city continue to cover annual pension benefits for retired employees and continue steadily paying down its unfunded, long-term pension liability, which the new study increased from $2 billion to nearly $2.4 billion.
Mayor Kevin Faulconer and the City Council created the city’s first pension stabilization fund last spring with a $16 million initial contribution, but they didn’t expect the money to get wiped out in one year.
The spike in pension debt also threatens millions of dollars in future pension savings that would be dedicated to infrastructure projects under Proposition H…
BTW here’s more “inconvenient truths” (i.e. news articles) that indicate blunders that remain unaddressed, ergo trouble is inevitable and this fact will have a knock on effect on my own “investments” and to protect gains have to ponder a hedge strategy
[quote=LA Times]
September 18, 2016
The pension gap
It was a deal that wasn’t supposed to cost taxpayers an extra dime. Now the state’s annual tab is in the billions, and the cost keeps climbing.
…This year, state employee pensions will cost taxpayers $5.4 billion, according to the Department of Finance. That’s more than the state will spend on environmental protection, fighting wildfires and the emergency response to the drought combined.
And it’s more than 30 times what the state paid for retirement benefits in 2000, before the effects of the new pension law, SB 400, had kicked in, according to data from the California Public Employees’ Retirement System…
…CalPERS had projected in 1999 that the improved benefits would cause no increase in the state’s annual pension contributions over the next 11 years. In fact, the state had to raise its payments by a total of $18 billion over that period to fill the gap, according to an analysis of CalPERS data.
The pension fund has not been able to catch up, even though financial markets eventually rebounded. That’s because during the lean years, older employees kept retiring and younger ones continued to build up credit toward their own pensions…
…Calpers,… keeps two sets of books: the officially stated numbers, and another set that reflects the “market value” of the pensions that people have earned. The second number is not publicly disclosed.
…governments nationwide do not know the true condition of the pension funds they are responsible for. That exposes millions of people, including retired public workers, local taxpayers and municipal bond buyers — who are often retirees themselves — to risks they have no way of knowing about.
…The market value of a pension reflects the full cost today of providing a steady, guaranteed income for life — and it’s large. Alarmingly large, in fact. This is one reason most states and cities don’t let the market numbers see the light of day.
…the routine practice of translating future pension payments into today’s dollars,… is called discounting.
…With everybody either retired, or about to be… there is no guesswork in determining everybody’s pensions. The actuaries at Calpers project each of the future monthly payments due… assuming they will live to age 90…. Then, they translate all those future payments into today’s dollars with a rate — often called a discount rate. This is exactly how a lender would calculate a home mortgage.
The problem is, which rate should be used? An economist would say the right rate for Calpers is the one for a risk-free bond, like a Treasury bond, because public pensions in California are guaranteed by the state and therefore risk-free. And that’s what Calpers does when it calculates market values. It used 2.56 percent when it calculated the bill…
But the rest of the time, Calpers and virtually all other public pension funds use their assumed annual rate of return on assets, now generally around 7.5 percent. Presto: This makes a pension appear to have a much smaller liability — or even a surplus…
