Next came the more thorny shift from paying out pensions based on final salaries at age 60 or 65 to cheaper ones based on a "career average" salary.
The normal retirement age in the armed forces is 55 and pension schemes are largely based on final salaries.
The report, released by the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate, a nonprofit research organization here, was based on final voting and registration statistics from the 2000 presidential election.
And he envisions his institution will eventually grant degrees in countless disciplines, based on final exams that would be administered once a month in convention halls around the world, with grading done by computer whenever possible.
And of course PepsiCo rarely sells products directly to consumers but as an intermediary through bottlers, distributors, wholesalers and retailers (so if anything $60bn understates PepsiCo's economic impact on national income, which is based on final values).
However, that greater security would push up the cost of the levy.The main concern, though, is ensuring that private pension schemes based on final salaries are properly funded, argues Michael Orszag, research director at Watson Wyatt, an actuarial firm.
Parliamentary pensions are the best in the land (unsurprising, since MPs can vote to set them), with double the accrual rate of those in the private-sector and based on final salaries to boot.
The winners will divide a jackpot that, based on final ticket sales, is worth $1.568 billion, with a cash option of $983.5 million, according to the North Carolina Education Lottery.
He will argue that teachers, hospital workers and police officers should contribute more to their pensions; that the most generous schemes based on final salaries should end; and that some people should work up to five years longer to claim their full pension entitlement.
Those that failed to act now face even bigger problems.Public employees are lucky: 84% of them have defined-benefit (DB) retirement plans, which guarantee a pension based on final salary and years of service, compared with a mere 21% of private-sector workers.
Source: author's elaboration based on final SAM.
