IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/buseco/v55y2020i3d10.1057_s11369-020-00183-3.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Public pension shortfalls and state economic growth: a preliminary examination

Author

Listed:
  • Charles Steindel

    (Ramapo College of New Jersey)

Abstract

Public pension funding problems may contribute to a state's poor economic performance. This paper examines that proposition, using state-level data on public pensions developed by the Pew Trust, and jointly by the Federal Reserve Board and the Bureau of Economic Analysis. There is little evidence that measures of the level of unfunded pension plan liabilities lead directly to a state's soft economic performance, though growth in unfunded liabilities appear to be associated with lower growth. While these results suggest that reductions in the growth of a state's pension debt may be beneficial, they arguably do not imply that dramatic action to reduce liabilities is necessarily called for. In that regard, the implications are comparable to those of Lenney et al. (2019), that suggest that reasonable goals for some presumed highly troubled systems are stabilization of the ratio of their unfunded liabilities to their state's nominal GDP, rather than outright elimination of the debt.

Suggested Citation

  • Charles Steindel, 2020. "Public pension shortfalls and state economic growth: a preliminary examination," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 55(3), pages 138-149, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:buseco:v:55:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1057_s11369-020-00183-3
    DOI: 10.1057/s11369-020-00183-3
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s11369-020-00183-3
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/s11369-020-00183-3?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert Novy-Marx & Joshua D. Rauh, 2009. "The Liabilities and Risks of State-Sponsored Pension Plans," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(4), pages 191-210, Fall.
    2. Jeffrey R. Brown & David W. Wilcox, 2009. "Discounting State and Local Pension Liabilities," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 538-542, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Carlos Vidal Meliá & Juan Manuel Pérez-Salamero González & Anne M. Garvey & Anna Castañer Garriga, 2024. "The supplementary table on pensions (Table 29): Actuarial Balance Sheet Update for the Spanish Pension System to 2021, Wave Three," Studies on the Spanish Economy eee2024-18, FEDEA.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Klaus Kaier & Christoph Müller, 2015. "New figures on unfunded public pension entitlements across Europe: concept, results and applications," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 42(4), pages 865-895, November.
    2. Robert Novy-Marx & Joshua D. Rauh, 2012. "Fiscal Imbalances and Borrowing Costs: Evidence from State Investment Losses," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 182-213, May.
    3. Meijdam, A.C. & Ponds, E.H.M., 2013. "On the Optimal Degree Of Funding Of Public Sector Pension Plans," Other publications TiSEM 1c5b7af1-e1ee-4d01-a341-f, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    4. Bohn, Henning, 2011. "Should public retirement plans be fully funded?," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(2), pages 195-219, April.
    5. Robert M. Costrell, 2018. "The 80% Pension Funding Target, High Assumed Returns, And Generational Inequity," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(3), pages 493-504, July.
    6. Don H. Chamberlain & L. Murphy Smith & Randall B. Bunker, 2016. "An examination of US state pensions by total state expenditures, state budget deficit and red v. blue state," International Journal of Economics and Accounting, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 7(1), pages 27-44.
    7. Byron Lutz & Louise Sheiner, 2013. "The Fiscal Stress Arising from State and Local Retiree Health Obligations," NBER Chapters, in: State and Local Health Plans for Active and Retired Public Employees, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. repec:nbr:nberch:12836 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Robert Novy-Marx & Joshua D. Rauh, 2012. "The Revenue Demands of Public Employee Pension Promises," NBER Working Papers 18489, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Grey Gordon & Pablo Guerrón-Quintana, 2021. "Public Debt, Private Pain: Regional Borrowing, Default, and Migration," Working Paper 21-13, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.
    11. Dashle Kelley, 2014. "The political economy of unfunded public pension liabilities," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 158(1), pages 21-38, January.
    12. Mohan, Nancy & Zhang, Ting, 2014. "An analysis of risk-taking behavior for public defined benefit pension plans," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 403-419.
    13. Anzia, Sarah F. & Moe, Terry M., 2016. "Interest Groups on the Inside: The Governance of Public Pension Funds," Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, Working Paper Series qt8c82g4hf, Institute of Industrial Relations, UC Berkeley.
    14. Robert L. Clark & Lee A. Craig & John Sabelhaus, 2011. "State and Local Retirement Plans in the United States," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 13685.
    15. Robert K. Triest & Bo Zhao, 2013. "The role of economic, fiscal, and financial shocks in the evolution of public sector pension funding," Working Papers 13-26, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    16. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09hi4ch92c6 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Michaelides, Alexander & Papakyriakou, Panayiotis & Milidonis, Andreas, 2019. "Corporate Pension Plan Funding Levels and Pension Assumptions," CEPR Discussion Papers 13591, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09hi4ch92c6 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Anantharaman, Divya & Henderson, Darren, 2021. "Contrasting the information demands of equity- and debt-holders: Evidence from pension liabilities," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(2).
    20. Vincent Touzé, 2011. "Le financement des retraites aux États-Unis," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03461438, HAL.
    21. Love, David A. & Smith, Paul A. & Wilcox, David W., 2011. "The effect of regulation on optimal corporate pension risk," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(1), pages 18-35, July.
    22. Brown, Jeffrey R. & Weisbenner, Scott J., 2014. "Why do individuals choose defined contribution plans? Evidence from participants in a large public plan," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 35-46.
    23. Siona Listokin & Meng-Hao Li & Abu Bakkar Siddique & Rajendra Kulkarni & Naoru Koizumi, 2023. "Public pension fund investments into hedge funds during the Great Recession: a network analysis," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 3(7), pages 1-17, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:buseco:v:55:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1057_s11369-020-00183-3. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.palgrave-journals.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.