Interview: Game-changing CAFR surplus trillions explained

(28-minute interview)

• Officials and corporate media never remind taxpayers, but California holds $600 billion in taxpayer cash and investments ($50,000 non-disclosed assets per household).

• California’s ~14,000 various government entities’ CAFRs have a sampled-data total estimate of $8 trillion in surplus taxpayer assets ($650,000 non-disclosed assets per household). For examples, page 63 of L.A. County’s 2011 CAFR shows $66 billion in cash and investments; City of L.A.’s CAFR page 58 shows $38 billion.

• The state’s $600 billion cash and investment fund is explained as designated for funding state pensions. The CAFR data show the opposite: $27 billion in pension cost receives only $1 billion income from $600 billion in withheld taxpayer assets, fund “managers” receive over twice the net income as California pensions receive, and a massive $68 billion increase in “fair value of investments” doesn’t translate to actual funding of pensions.

• Californians are taxed $19 billion to pay for pensions (95% of the public cost) while also losing $50,000 in assets the state withholds in cash and investments.

• The $600 billion fund in cash and investments contributed 4% of the state’s $27 billion pension costs, but since 2008 has been “managed” to cost taxpayers more than the net income it produces.

• Governor Brown is silent about the $600 billion in surplus cash and investments, claiming the $16 billion budget deficit can only be addressed by austerity – massive funding cuts to our essential infrastructure. A 2.8% divestment of the fund would cover the $16 billion deficit.

SOURCE Washingtonsblog