Special Briefing: Assuring Public Worker Retirement Security Amid COVID-19 Fiscal Stress

Penn IUR and the Volcker Alliance will host an online briefing to discuss how states and localities are addressing trillions of dollars in public employee retirement obligations as governments balance budgets amid the COVID-19 pandemic and recession. The briefing will present the BEA’s new comprehensive state-level pension data, starting in 2000, consistently measured on an accrual basis, using a common discount rate, and benchmarked to the 2017 Census of Governments.

Moderated by William Glasgall, Senior Vice President and Director of State and Local Initiatives, Volcker Alliance, and Penn IUR Co-Director Susan Wachter, this briefing will be the 15th in a series of 60-minute online conversations featuring experts from the Volcker Alliance’s national research network and Penn IUR, along with other leading academics, economists, and fiscal policy leaders from around the U.S.

This special briefing will feature presentations by Donald Boyd, Co-Director, Project on State and Local Government Finance, SUNY Albany; David Lenze, Economist, Regional Economic Accounts, Bureau of Economic Analysis; Timothy Little, Director and Lead Analyst, US States, S&P Global Ratings US Public Finance; Stephanie Miner, former Mayor, Syracuse, New York, and Director, Volcker Alliance; and Herman B. Santos, Chair, Board of Retirement, Los Angeles County Employees Retirement System, and Chair, Regional SEIU Local 721 Secure Retirement Committee.