California

are obscene in this state. At 30 years, they retire at 90% salary, and we, the voters voted for that. I have brother-in-law that is a retired fireman. I know these people work hard and risk their lives, but so do lots of other occupations. His monthly retirement check is over $10,000 after taxes are taken out. He retired in his mid 50s. He may very well wind up being paid more money in retirement than he made while working. If only Social Security worked like that.

To be fair, they do pay into this fund when they are still working, but not an amount that generates that kind of retirement pay. The CalPers funds are invested like any retirement funds usually are. The sweetest part of the deal is if the stock market crashes, or the investments go bad in some other way, the taxpayers of California are responsible for making up the shortage. And yes, we voted for that, too.