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  • Preventing Bankruptcy in State and Local Pension Plans in Colorado0

    • August 22, 2012

    State and local governments report the funding status of their pension plans in financial statements following standards set by the Government Accounting Standards Board (GASB). Historically, those standards allowed state and local governments to use an actuarial model and to discount liabilities based on the long-term yield on the assets held in the pension fund. The Colorado Public Employees’ Retirement Association (PERA) uses an 8 percent discount rate comparable to that used in most state and local pension plans. GASB also allowed state and local governments to use a smoothing technique to calculate the funding status of the plans. With this smoothing technique, losses incurred on assets in one year could be averaged over several years.

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  • How Colorado’s Tax Burdens Rank Nationally0

    • February 8, 2012

    Residents of Colorado should know how their tax burden compares with Americans throughout the nation. Colorado ranks 26th nationally, compared to all other states for the combined state and local tax burden, on a per capita basis.

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  • How Much Does Government Cost You?0

    • September 17, 2010

    Thanks to our friends at the Independent Institute out in Oakland, California, regular folks like us can figure out just how much the government is costing us in direct payments and in lost earnings over our lifetime.  From the About Page on the MyGovCost website, The Government Cost Calculator is a unique service from The

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  • Levels of Long-Term Debt Within Colorado’s Local Government0

    • July 5, 2010

    The world is seeing levels of unprecedented government debt. However, the media focuses mostly on debt levels of national and state governments. For the most part, the general public has ignored the subject of local government debt. The root cause of this ignorance lies in the difficulty associated with uncovering information on local debt.

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