The Manhattan Institute released a study today, Underfunded Teacher Pension Plans: It’s Worse Than You Think.  Read the report brief or the full report. 

The study puts Kansas among the five worst in funding teacher pension plans.

From their research brief:

The Foundation for Educational Choice and the Manhattan Institute recently commissioned a new study to examine the emerging crisis of underfunding public teacher pension plans in the states. The implications for public policy will likely be severe in the coming years. Public funding for K-12 education, and the potential for new reforms literally hang in the balance. …

Teacher pension liabilities for all 50 states now total almost $1 trillion, almost triple the cost of what state officials have on their balance sheets, an unfunded public burden that could bankrupt state budgets including education programs in future years.  …

The worst-funded plan in our sample is the West Virginia Teachers’ Retirement System, which we estimate to be only 31 percent funded. The four states whose plans have the next-worst funding gaps are Illinois, Oklahoma, Indiana, and Kansas; all are less than 40 percent funded.

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Related:

• West Virginia Has Worst Funded Teacher Pension Plan in Nation, West Virginia Watchdog, April 14, 2010.

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Contact: Earl F Glynn, earl@kansaswatchdog.org, KansasWatchdog.org