First of all, considering it is the topic of government employees being screwed out of their pensions you'd think the thread would be 300 blazing posts long of indignation and moral outrage.
Yet, it only garners a measly 7 replies.
As Frank says, "One wonders what's up with that."
alp227 (19,129 posts)
S.E.C. Accuses Illinois of Securities Fraud
Source: nyt
For the second time in history, federal regulators accused an American state of securities fraud on Monday, ordering Illinois to stop misleading investors about the condition of its public pension system.
In announcing a settlement with the state, the Securities and Exchange Commission said Illinois had passed a law in 1994 allowing itself to put less than the required amount into its pension system each year. For the next 15 years, the state issued annual reports showing that it was on track with its lawful schedule, even as it fell further behind the real-world amount needed to pay all public retirees their benefits. In 2005, the state passed another law giving itself a holiday from even the inadequate amounts on the schedule.
From 2005 to 2009, Illinois issued $2.2 billion worth of municipal bonds, which the S.E.C. said were marketed under false pretenses. There was a growing hole in the pension system, putting increasing pressure on the state’s finances every year. That raised the risk that at some point retirees and bond buyers would be competing for the same limited money. The risk grew greater every year, the S.E.C. said, but investors could not see it by looking at Illinois’ disclosures.
In effect, that meant investors overpaid for bonds of a lower quality than they were made out to have, although the S.E.C. did not measure any loss. In Monday’s settlement with the S.E.C., Illinois agreed to a cease-and-desist order without admitting or denying the accusations.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/12/business/sec-accuses-illinois-of-securities-fraud.html
AnotherMcIntosh (5,907 posts)
1. If there is a more corrupt State than Illinois, where is it? The chant "We're #1" applies to us.
I bet it is so corrupt nobody can get into the system unless they play along.
secondvariety (386 posts)
3. Florida's not far behind.
Luckily, we have a couple of good newspapers in the state that calls the politicians' bullshit.
Yes, Florida. Any other state to take one's eyes off of the state about which the OP is written.
Bjorn Against (7,874 posts)
4. No doubt there has been a lot of corruption in IL
I will say however it seems like corrupt IL politicians at least get prosecuted, in many other states I see lots of corruption that never gets prosecuted. I think for that reason it is hard to measure the most corrupt state, far too often corruption goes unpunished. I do believe that IL may have the most prosecuted officials, but states like Florida and Wisconsin have a lot of corrupt politicians who have not been prosecuted.
I bet some politicians from IL have had their dirty laundry aired only to be ignored for the sake of preserving the mythology built around them
AnotherMcIntosh (5,907 posts)
7. It may seem like a lot get prosecuted (in comparison to other States) but we have a target-rich
environment.
For an Illinois politician to actually get prosecuted, after years of corruption, some unusual event has to occur.
Former Gov Blagojevich, for example, had been the Governor for about six years. Six years without any prosecution. However, immediately after he stood up for some blue-collar workers who were being laid off (not untypical for him), tried to get the Bank of America to honor a lay-off agreement without success, and announced that he was ordering all Illinois governmental offices to cease doing business with the BofA, something happened. He was then arrested and prosecuted.
Former Gov Ryan was on the take as well. At the top level, certain persons were raising cash for him by selling commercial truck driving licenses. People were traveling from other States to get such licenses, and foreigners were getting truck driving licenses. All that was needed was cash. Then an accident occurred in which a entire family with children were killed in a fiery wreck. It was too much to ignore.
Illinois is known as a pay-to-play State. Bring money and there are politicians and others who will be willing to help. A major player in the privatization of the Chicago school system, and is in the process of harvesting public assets, is someone who helped Rahm get elected.
Thankfully, Obama is not part of this, or so I've been told.
Good enough for me so we'll just leave it at that.
dixiegrrrrl (29,361 posts)
2. Makes me immediately thnk of Cal. Calipers retirement system.
which has gotten in trouble before for mis-management.
Wonder how many other state retirement systems are having the same problem???
CO states its ROI is 8% and uses that figure to off-set required state contributions.
Teamster Jeff (754 posts)
5. Still waiting for the SEC to go after the banksters
Not holding my breath though since most of them don't want to piss off their future employers.
If you need to find them I hear they're huddled up at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Washington DC.
If you hurry you can catch them having lunch.
former9thward (5,920 posts)
6. The State of Illinois offered me a buyout of my pension in 2004.
I saw the writing on the wall and took it and ran. I put the money into a self directed IRA and now have 12 times what the state gave me. A very poorly managed system.
I hear the Paul Ryan plan woul allow everybody else to do the same thing.
So we can't have that.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014421401
