Tired of complaints about pension funds

I am so sick of hearing uninformed people complain about pension funds. I have heard nobody claim we need to raise pensions, as Chris Frantzen states in the Dec. 31 Fence Post.

State employees are fighting to not have pensions reduced or destroyed, not to increase them. Also, is Chris aware that a large percentage of state employee pensions are funded by the employees themselves? Furthermore, is Chris aware that the state has been “borrowing” huge amounts from pension funds in Illinois to fund other crises? Also, these same people decided not to go into jobs like police, fire protection and teaching positions because they didn't make enough money.

I always heard people say that they wanted to make the “big bucks,” that teachers and cops just don't make any money. So these same people went into jobs like accounting and sales. They were happy to make the big money and did very little complaining about how state employees made far less money.

Well, one of the reasons people find those state positions attractive is because of better security and government pension. But now, many of the high pay positions have fallen upon hard times, so, the solution of the rich and spoiled. They want to take away the security that went with the government positions. How much more money did a CPA make five years ago than a police officer or teacher? Are they going to give that money back?

The very people that shunned these jobs because they were beneath them are now jealous that they have the pension security that they choose over the big salary. Maybe we should transfer all state pension funds to the “I used to make a lot of money but now I made a decision based on greed and now I don't have the security I shunned earlier” fund.

Stephen Irmick

Naperville