Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Rewarding failure

When people talk about the "culture of Harrisburg," it's not just corruption on the part of elected officials. It's a world view that it's OK to spend other people's money with impunity.

A perfect example is the recent revelation that the people who manage the state's teacher retirement funds were awarded $854,000 in bonuses even though the retirement fund lost $1.8 billion.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review is incredulous at this latest example of greed and stupidity.

From a Tribune-Review editorial:
Giving bonuses of more than $854,000 for the fiscal year to 21 investment staffers of the Pennsylvania Public School Employees' Retirement System -- a fund that lost $1.8 billion -- defies belief.

The system, which was created in 1917 and now serves more than 600,000 individuals, has approximately $62.7 billion in net assets. The bonuses ranged from $9,720 to $106,223 for the fiscal year that ended June 30. The base salaries of the fund's investment staff are between $63,179 and $251,542.
Read the full editorial at the newspaper's Web site.

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