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New York public pension costs to balloon in next five years

08 December 2010 04:29 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. The tax-funded annual contributions to public pensions in New York State will rise by billions of dollars in the next five years, the Empire Center for New York State Policy said in a report on Tuesday, APA reports quoting Xinhua News Agency.

Taxpayer contributions to the New York State Teachers’ Retirement System (NYSTRS) could more than quadruple, rising from about 900 million U.S. dollars as of 2010-11 to about 4.5 billion U.S. dollars by 2016, according to the report by the think tank.

Taxpayer contributions to the New York State and Local Retirement System (NYSLRS) could double over the next five years, adding nearly 4 billion U.S. dollars to annual taxpayer costs, the report said.

The report also estimated that NYSLRS is 71 billion U.S. dollars short of what it will need to fund its pension obligations, and that NYSTRS has a funding shortfall of 49 billion U.S. dollars.

It suggested that New York needs to enact fundamental pension reform to permanently eliminate the risks and unpredictability inherent in the traditional pension system.