[The-Shoveler]

[quote=CA renter][quote=The-Shoveler][quote=The-Shoveler]I am wondering if this takes into account making CalPers Whole?

The City of L.A. is claiming a balanced budget as well At least they made the future hires retire a SS retirement age (67) instead of 55 and eliminated Pension spiking.

I wonder if the pension no-spiking rule can be retroactive.

Anyway it’s a start, I just have my doubts, sounds too good to be true.[/quote]

What shows up in the headlines and what does not,

I Imagine it is much the same for the state finances, well at least we are not going further in the hole right !

Los Angeles teeters on the brink of bankruptcy

Stanford’s study also estimated that each of the city’s three independent pension funds is unfunded by billions of dollars: the city of Los Angeles Fire and Police Pension System is $9.25 billion unfunded; the Los Angeles City Employees’ Retirement System is $11.32 billion unfunded; and the city of Los Angeles Water and Power Employees’ Retirement System is $6.59 billion unfunded.

“In 1999, Los Angeles City’s aggregate annual required contributions for its three systems totaled $291 million, rising to $923 million in 2011, an annual average growth rate of 11.1 percent,” according to the Stanford report.

But here is the kicker: The growth in pension spending by the city “outpaced that of spending on public protection, which grew at 5.2 percent, on health and sanitation (3.6 percent), and on recreation and cultural services (5.8 percent), and it occurred while spending on public assistance programs fell by an average of 3.0 percent per year.”

If the trend continues, the city will be little more than a professional retirement payment and processing service.[/quote]

You’re ignoring the fact that many public employers enacted “pension holidays” during the stock market boom because the pension funds were over-funded. This is why pension critics like to use the peak years of the stock market bubble as a starting point. Many employers (and employees) were paying NOTHING toward pension contributions during those years. The few who were making contributions were doing so at a historically low rate. Contribution rates are not linear, and are tied more to investment returns than to population trends.

Look at pages 21 and 22 to get a better idea of what’s been going on with pension contributions:

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:Tt2hd1QJEjoJ:www.calpersresponds.com/downloads/California-Retirement%2520Dialog-PPT-Milligan-v4.ppt+&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESjcmD07sH4IWy1r2ZwUqksUedY03rMHyPnecHKE3qmCguYPyNO2FrkhhvQBIN6YFuEFfarUwnpT2pDc0NQVzOlKgjEedbuYzy-V8JpZn-K4VgLlXLhLJ6WsvdTKUsgPfPErspXu&sig=AHIEtbTi01lxN8QEsrCBiEl-01EmyTrBtg%5B/quote%5D

Yea that was not the brightest Idea, but I guess they looked at the stock bubble returns and thought, Hey that looks like it will go on forever !!, kind of like the housing bubble as well.
But anyway there are probably a lot better examples of responsibility than the city of L.A. (Pension spiking was epidemic in L.A.) but it just happens to be the biggest in the state (although I will have to admit they did take some drastic measures to balance the budget this year, it’s just kind of futile at this point without some major inflation IMO).
But for L.A. anyway, it’s going to take an economic miracle for a 7-billion in revenue to make up for a 26 or so billion and growing short fall.

[The-Shoveler]

I have heard that there is a limit of four loans if your loan is funded by a GSE, if privately funded then there is no limit as long as you can prove income and or equity.

[The-Shoveler]

[quote=The-Shoveler]I am wondering if this takes into account making CalPers Whole?

The City of L.A. is claiming a balanced budget as well At least they made the future hires retire a SS retirement age (67) instead of 55 and eliminated Pension spiking.

I wonder if the pension no-spiking rule can be retroactive.

Anyway it’s a start, I just have my doubts, sounds too good to be true.[/quote]

What shows up in the headlines and what does not,

I Imagine it is much the same for the state finances, well at least we are not going further in the hole right !

Los Angeles teeters on the brink of bankruptcy

Stanford’s study also estimated that each of the city’s three independent pension funds is unfunded by billions of dollars: the city of Los Angeles Fire and Police Pension System is $9.25 billion unfunded; the Los Angeles City Employees’ Retirement System is $11.32 billion unfunded; and the city of Los Angeles Water and Power Employees’ Retirement System is $6.59 billion unfunded.

“In 1999, Los Angeles City’s aggregate annual required contributions for its three systems totaled $291 million, rising to $923 million in 2011, an annual average growth rate of 11.1 percent,” according to the Stanford report.

But here is the kicker: The growth in pension spending by the city “outpaced that of spending on public protection, which grew at 5.2 percent, on health and sanitation (3.6 percent), and on recreation and cultural services (5.8 percent), and it occurred while spending on public assistance programs fell by an average of 3.0 percent per year.”

If the trend continues, the city will be little more than a professional retirement payment and processing service.

[The-Shoveler]

I am wondering if this takes into account making CalPers Whole?

The City of L.A. is claiming a balanced budget as well At least they made the future hires retire a SS retirement age (67) instead of 55 and eliminated Pension spiking.

I wonder if the pension no-spiking rule can be retroactive.

Anyway it’s a start, I just have my doubts, sounds too good to be true.

[The-Shoveler]

You would think that IF the economy is improving, they would not be axing
Does anyone have a chart showing Financial firms layoff and the next direction of the economy/(or market),

Seems like they would be expecting a downturn if they are axing but then again I don’t know jack about that industry.

[The-Shoveler]

[quote=AN][quote=SK in CV][quote=AN]budget schmudget… we’ll just print a few trillion dollar coin… then voila budget problem fixed.[/quote]

That’s quite the straw man. Nobody has proposed that a trillion dollar coin will fix anything. It’s a short term solution to a purely political obstacle.[/quote]
I guess jests doesn’t go over well over the internet. It wasn’t mean to be a real argument.[/quote]

I don’t want to go tooo deeply into the trillion dollar coin debate, but really I don’t think someone like say china would stop taking our dollars over this, (really I honestly think “china” is printing a heck of a lot of money that’s not being advertised).

So you really think we will ever be able to pay the national debt without say 7-8% inflation?

[The-Shoveler]

[quote=AN][quote=The-Shoveler]I have to add a few things guys,
1)Unless you work for a sizable company, your insurance will cancel you in a heartbeat If you get really sick.
2) in the 70’s none of this spend less than you earn stuff would have worked very well for you.
(buy now you will be able to afford it later worked much better in most cases back then)

The last 25 years of mostly low inflation are really the exception,

Was anyone here earning a living back in the 70’s,

Just curious, back then you always tried to buy more of anything than you could afford (because that is what worked),[/quote]
That’s not true, even in the 70s with high inflation, if you live below your means, then you’d have more money to invest. Buying more junk to pay off later won’t get you any closer to retirement or expanding your nest egg.[/quote]

Yea well OK but it did work for things like work trucks, and buying more home than you could afford generally worked very well for you.( the Stock market really sucked back then, it cost more for a taxi license than a seat on the exchange).

[The-Shoveler]

[quote=The-Shoveler]I have to add a few things guys,
1)Unless you work for a sizable company, your insurance will cancel you in a heartbeat If you get really sick.
2) in the 70’s none of this spend less than you earn stuff would have worked very well for you.
(buy now you will be able to afford it later worked much better in most cases back then)

The last 25 years of mostly low inflation are really the exception,

Was anyone here earning a living back in the 70’s,

Just curious, back then you always tried to buy more of anything than you could afford (because that is what worked),[/quote]

Yea an even Gold did not really work for you back then either.

[The-Shoveler]

I have to add a few things guys,
1)Unless you work for a sizable company, your insurance will cancel you in a heartbeat If you get really sick.
2) in the 70’s none of this spend less than you earn stuff would have worked very well for you.
(buy now you will be able to afford it later worked much better in most cases back then)

The last 25 years of mostly low inflation are really the exception,

Was anyone here earning a living back in the 70’s,

Just curious, back then you always tried to buy more of anything than you could afford (because that is what worked),

[The-Shoveler]

I am waiting for someone to come out with a course on getting rich buying storage lockers,
I have seen every episode of storage wars and I am hooked.
Just kidding sort of,

But this little bit is the one thing I have been told for the last 25 or more years and it is the one thing I had wished I listened to.

“invest in market index funds. They won’t make one rich but they offer the best return with the least amount of risk”

Gordon Gecko I am not.

[The-Shoveler]

Sounds like a clever marketing ploy (you know like Goldman saying Oil going to 200 a barrel).
But I have always said that sooner or later you will run out of cheaper to buy that it cost to build foreclosures so I think we are getting close to that point.

[The-Shoveler]

I think the S&P was up like 10%, just imagine if it had been a bad year LOL.
Not to worry, just cut more services, increase taxes I am sure we make this whole and not have any inflation.
7.5 % from here to eternity and beyond !!!

I am sure they have great management I am sure it was the best team gov planning could put together.

[The-Shoveler]

From my limited observation talking to a few who have built their place, it is very hard to beat the big developers in price per Sq foot unless you do the majority of the work yourself.

And you plan on being the General contractor etc…

Anyway, maybe a limited subset or people who tried this, but most were BURNED!!!!! Very badly.
Some never completed or were forced into BK or near BK.
try to buy something existing if you are not going to be doing the management and most of the nail pounding.

[The-Shoveler]

Near the coast there is just not a lot of buildable land IMO and what is there is very costly to develop.

Out in east county and SWRC there is a lot more buildable land so I would expect that to keep a lid on prices for a while yet.

Near the coast I would expect things will get more and more ridiculous as far as price. JMHO.

The above might change if something like super storm sandy hit SoCal. I guess we wait and see.

[The-Shoveler]

Shoveler’s 2 cents
1) Get your bucket list over while you’re young enough to
a) Enjoy it,
b) Accomplish it.
You never know what will happen in the future.

2)Never fully retire, get some side biz going, you will get bored and your brain will turn to mush if you sit around watching TV etc… all day. Also a pension is great sure but it can be eaten away by inflation much faster than most think it can.

3)Stay as healthy as you possibly can, Health is the greatest wealth you have.
(No point being a multimillionaire if you’re not able to get out and enjoy it).

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