JACKSON, Miss. (WJTV) – A House select committee formed by House Speaker Jason White (R-Miss.) is taking a deeper look at the Public Employees’ Retirement System (PERS).
House PERS Select Co-Chair Randy Rushing (R-District 78) told the committee on Monday that state employees whose retirement comes from PERS have no need to worry.
“If anything, be happy we’re having these meetings. Because that is strictly just to make sure that the PERS system is around for many, many years to come,” he said.
Ray Higgins, the executive director of PERS, encouraged lawmakers to aim for full funding of the system.
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“If we were 80% funded now as opposed to 56% funded, we would all feel a lot better, and we’d be having different conversations. But it’s important to be aiming for the full funding because you never know what’s going to happen,” he said.
Lawmakers heard from several consultants who presented potential solutions to fully fund the retirement system and make sure benefits don’t run out.
“Based upon the current contributions, there’s little to no expectation that the unfunded accrued liabilities is going to go down at all in the next 20 years. It’s going to stay up right around that $26 billion figure. And then when we get all the way to the end of that, we still have roughly $10 billion left in unfunded liability,” said Paul Wood, senior consultant and actuary with GRS Consulting.
He said this means lawmakers need to find additional funds for PERS.
“We need to make sure that we are putting additional funding into the system each year to prop it up. Right now, our contributions from our employees and our employers are not meeting what we need at home when they’re over there writing the checks every month and every year for the 13th check,” said Rushing.
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