If you didn’t know any better, you’d think CalPERS is the source of all California’s ills: higher taxes, bankrupt cities, reduced public services, lavish pensions—the list goes on. We’ve even been blamed for failing to catch the fact that Wells Fargo employees were creating fake bank accounts.
There’s undoubtedly a cost to pensions. And as a member of the CalPERS board and a committed fiscal conservative, I was just as eager as anyone to understand the costs and inner workings of the system. But what has surprised me during my six-year tenure on the board is how the finger-pointing and outright criticism of CalPERS and its leaders is often misplaced, misinformed and too often even mean-spirited.
Read the article here.