03/2012 - Redefining State Retirement

1. How much attention have you paid to news about Governor Bobby Jindal’s plan to reform Louisiana’s pension system?

2. Overall, would you say you support or oppose Governor Jindal’s plan to reform Louisiana’s pension system?

3. When it comes to the Louisiana's public retirement system, would you say:

4. Relative to other issues and concerns, how much of priority is reforming the state’s pension system?

5. Please tell if you agree or disagree with the following statement: If Louisiana government does nothing to reform the state pension system, drastic cuts will have to be made to other areas of government such as health care and higher education.

6. Next are a number of suggestions that have been made for reforming the state’s public retirement system. Please tell if you support or oppose each item.

Increasing the retirement age to 67 for current state employees under age 55. Employees 55 years old and older would be exempted.

7. Changing the way that retirement benefits are calculated by basing retirements on an average over the last five years of employment instead of the last three years.

8. Only providing cost of living adjustments to retirement plans when there is enough money in the state budget to cover the costs.

9. Increasing employee contributions to their retirement plans by 3 percentage points from 7% to 10%.

10. And if reforms are made to the state’s public retirement system, would you agree or disagree with a proposal to exempt teachers and first responders from these changes?