# Franken & Warren challenge Obama appointee Antonio Weiss **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 29, 2014, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469 "2014-12-29T20:32:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2014, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469/21 "2014-12-30T17:53:55Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Not only that, but the public workforce has become so large that it’s actually preventing liberals from spending money on what they really want to spend money on. Especially in blue states. THeir budgets are getting increasingly eaten up by salaries and pensions. Cite? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2014, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469/22 "2014-12-30T17:58:16Z")
Remember that when the US ordered John Rockefeller to break up the Standard Oil trust, there was only one man qualified to do it. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2014, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469/23 "2014-12-30T18:02:00Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Cite? > **[Illinois Risks Default If It Doesn’t Tackle Its Public Pension Crisis](https://www.businessinsider.com/illinoiss-public-pension-crisis-2014-12)** > > It's a massive, complex mess. This large Midwestern state, with a population of 13 million (Greece has 11 million, though a far smaller GDP than Illinois), has the most underfunded retirement system of any state and the largest pension burden relative to state revenue. It also has the highest number of public-pension funds close to insolvency, such as the one looking after Chicago’s police and firemen. According to the Civic Federation, a budget watchdog, Illinois has piled up a whopping $111 billion in unfunded pension liabilities (see chart), in addition to $56 billion in debt for health benefits for pensioners. The state devotes one in four of its tax dollars to pensions, which is more than it spends on primary and secondary education. Mainly as a result of this gargantuan pension debt, Illinois’s bond rating is the lowest of all the states, which means dramatically higher borrowing costs. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2014, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469/24 "2014-12-30T18:28:19Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Cite? > **[US Federal State Local Spending for 2025 - Charts Tables History](http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/California_state_spending.html)** > > Numbers, pie charts, trends for US Government Spending in 2025: Pensions, Healthcare, Education, Defense, Welfare. Data from OMB, Census Bureau. You can easily look at other blue states and then compare to whatever red states you want. Then there’s this rather creative attempt by Illinois’ governor to explain the problem to voters: He called it "the most urgent issue facing our state", which coming from the governor is a pretty definitive cite. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2014, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469/25 "2014-12-30T18:57:17Z")
Thanks for the good cites that some states have underfunded pensions to spend money on other things, but the claim was that pensions were sucking up all the money that lib’ruls want to spend on other things. You’re both proving the opposite of **adaher** ’s claim. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2014, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469/26 "2014-12-30T20:19:42Z")
Given the rate at which pensions are growing and the difficulty of raising taxes in already high tax states, there is no new money to be found for the things liberals want to do. And it’s sucking up an increasing share of the existing revenue base as well. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/franken-warren-challenge-obama-appointee-antonio-weiss/708469.md?page=1)