Pension editorial is one-sided

I suppose I should no longer be shocked when the Herald takes a short-sighted, or in this case, one sided view. Your siding with "municipalities" on what you refer to as "lush public sector benefits" displays your lack of understanding of the bigger picture ("Listen to cities on growing pension impact," April 2).

What you refer to as a "lush benefit," I would characterize as reasonable, given what police and firemen do to earn it on a daily basis. When everyone is running away from trouble, cops and firefighters are heading to it. Nights, weekends, holidays, it doesn't matter, 911 always works. Their pay does not reflect the risk they take daily to serve and protect, so as an incentive -- if they live long enough -- they can collect an attractive pension, which they pay into their entire career.

Your editorial assumes that a retired officer or fireman is going to be collecting a pension for as many years as they work, but that is a false assumption. Police officers die much younger, averaging age 54, then the national average of around 76, due to years and years of physiological damage done to their bodies by high stress work. The average Chicago police officer will collect only 16 pension checks before dying. That's less then a year and a half of retirement. It probably doesn't even recoup his contributions over his working life.

Before you gripe about "lush" benefits, ask yourself how many people have to put on body armor everyday to go to work? How many news editors died in the line of duty last year?

Ken Heerdegen

Grayslake