Paterson Offers Pension Reforms to Balance Budget

New York, NY —

Future employees of the state of New York will get less generous retirement benefits, now that Gov. David Paterson signed into law a bill creating a new pension tier.

Paterson says the state can no longer afford to be as generous with pension benefits as it has in the past and that newly hired employees will get less. "This new pension system will be one that we think will be sustainable over the next score of years," he says.

At the same time, the governor offered future savings for local governments and schools in the pension reforms. He continues to say he'll have to withhold some of their December state aid payments because New York is running out of money. The State Comptroller has begun issuing daily cash balance updates, saying that while the state does have enough to pay it's bills today, that will likely not be the case tomorrow.