United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS), Ford Motor Company (F): The True Crisis Over Public Pensions

But the more important issue is how, for workers, falling benefits and increased contributions add up to increased economic pressure now. Even the CRR study acknowledges that plans won’t necessarily stick with reforms in the long run, instead bowing to increasing public pressure to expand benefits once again after the economy begins to improve more strongly.

As a result, the true crisis over public pensions might well come not from the financial condition of the plans themselves but rather from the shock that future retirees face when they realize that the benefits they had hoped would sustain them prove inadequate to the task. For workers with enough time before they retire, personal financial planning of their own can help them overcome their new challenge. But no one should dismiss the cost that employees are increasingly bearing in efforts to shore up pension-fund finances — even if public pensions eventually do get a clean bill of health as recent stock market gains take hold.

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The article The True Crisis Over Public Pensions originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributor Dan Caplinger has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Ford and United Parcel Service (NYSE:UPS). The Motley Fool owns shares of Ford and Lockheed Martin.

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