Pension Panic: Round XXII

There has been a flurry of recent articles touting recent work by Stanford Business School Professor Joshua Rauh, arguing that state and local pension fund liabilities are far larger than generally reported. Rauh puts the unfunded liabilities of state and local pension funds at $3.4 trillion, more than three times the figures that the pensions themselves calculate. He predicts looming crises with many local governments driven into bankruptcy.

The reason for the difference between Rauh’s $3.4...