407,000 Workers Stunned as Pension Fund Proposes 60% Cuts

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Many state, municipal, and private pension funds are badly underfunded according to the accounting formulas. In negotiations with workers, particularly unions, it has always been easier for managers to make promises of pension payments down the line butnever so easy to put aside the noney needed to fund that. But also the accounting formulas are unrealistically optimistic. They assume that money put aside will earn returns at 7% annually or higher. The economy just isn't growing that fast anymore, and probably will not in the coming decades. So even pensions which are supposedly "fully funded" now are likely to come up short in the coming years.

as long as the management company was able to steal that 40% of the money then it will all work out.

This is just another reason why some form of basic income is essentially inevitable.

I'm not much of a finance guy so please tell me how this is different than a Ponzi scheme.

the kind of insolvency that zerohedge would have a field day over