$300,000 Pension?

This is James Hunderfund. Last year he recieved a taxpayer pension of $316,245.

He's not alone, either.

According to the pension search engine at See Through New York, there are several people who recieved a pension from We The Taxpayers in excess of $200,000 in 2009 (16 are listed, but certain persons such as ex-Governors aren't listed).

This is nonsense!

I have a suggestion to help curb our out-of-control state spending: Cap civil service pensions at $90,000 per year. According to my math (and anyone can go to the link above and recheck my math), this would have saved the taxpayers in excess of $63.6 million annually!

And to the 3,760 retired civil servants making more than $90,000 per year in retirement benefits: We The Taxpayers can't afford to subsidize your lifestyle any longer. Our state has a $9 BILLION budget deficit.

In a sense, you could say our state retirement system is "Hunderfund-ed".

Note: I obtained the $63.6 million figure by searching pension recipients for 2009 in excess of $90,000, averaging the first 100 results, subtract $90,000 from the average, and then multiplying by 37.6 to account for 3,760 recipients. If anyone would like to do the math for all 3,760 recipients, be my guest!