In two recent articles, the Governing Institute cites my work about the looming pension crisis for workers in the U.S. On June 14, 201 in the article "America's Looming Pension Shock," Governing's Director Mark Funkhouser discusses the effects of decreasing public pensions for workers as they reach retirement. He writes, "but Teresa Ghilarducci, director of the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis at the New School in New York City and author of "When I'm Sixty-Four: the Plot against Pensions and the Plan to Save Them," would tell these government leaders that cuts in government workers' pension benefits are contributing to another impending crisis that they should begin to think about." He continues by bringing attention to my Guaranteed Retirement Accounts plan as a potential solution.
On June 28, 2012 in "The Very Public Private-Sector Retirement Problem," Governing's Penelope Lemov continues the discussion by writing about the inadequacy of 401(k) plans in providing a secure retirement income in the face of pension shortfalls and potential state-level solutions to address the crisis. She draws attention to recent legislation in California introduced by Senator de Leon that would allow workers without work-based retirement accounts, like a traditional defined benefit pension or a defined contribution 401(k), to automatically be included in a state-run plan. The plan has already been approved by the California State Senate, and if it passes through the State Assembly, I predict that a handful of states will follow suit quickly. New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut are already considering similar plans.