New paper: “The Impact of Public Pensions on State and Local Budgets”

The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College has released a new Issue in Brief:  "The Impact of Public Pensions on State and Local Budgets" by Alicia H. Munnell, Jean-Pierre Aubry, and Laura Quinby.

The brief's key findings are:

• Currently, state and local pension contributions equal 3.8 percent of total budgets.
  
• To get back on a path to full funding, sponsors will need to contribute:
  

  5.0 percent of budgets if liabilities are discounted by 8 percent; or
  9.1 percent of budgets if liabilities are discounted at 5 percent.
  

• But states with seriously underfunded plans and/or generous benefits – like CA, IL, and NJ – will need to contribute significantly more.
  

The brief is available here.