While America Aged: How Pension Debts Ruined General Motors, Stopped the NYC Subways, Bankrupted San Diego, and Loom as the Next Financial Hardcover - 2008

by Roger Lowenstein

From the bestselling author of Buffett, When Genius Failed, and Originsof the Crash, a wake-up call to the pension and retirement crisis facingAmerica and the road map for a way out

In While America Aged, bestselling author RogerLowenstein explains how corporations and governments ran upruinous pension and health-care promises to workers promisesthat are now coming due and that will hit America like atsunami if nothing is done.

Negotiating high benefits means gambling withfuture finances and when the farm gets sold out from underneathmajor corporations or public institutions, it affects allof us, and in ways we might not imagine. With his trademarknarrative panache, Lowenstein unravels the truth about howpensions work in America and illuminates the impending crisis.While America Aged is comprised of three fascinating case studies each an object lesson and a compelling historical saga. Thefirst goes back to the early days of the United Auto Workers andits crusading leader, Walter Reuther, to tell the story of howpensions and health-care obligations destroyed the Americanauto industry, in particular General Motors.

Lowenstein then shifts the scene to New York Cityto tell the story of the rise of public pensions and public sectorunions through the vehicle of the Communist-led TransportWorkers Union. Once again, justifiable benefits were followedby outrageous ones, such as the right to retire at age fifty.The saga reached a dramatic climax in 2005, when workersresponded to proposed pension cutbacks with a massive strikethat brought New York's subways and buses to a screeching haltdays before Christmas.

In the concluding episode, Lowenstein visits ametropolis even more reckless in doling out benefits SanDiego. Desperate not to impose higher taxes, city officialsin this highly conservative enclave cut a series of deals withunions to short-change the retirement system and use pensionfunds to run the city. A massive scandal ensued two mayorsresigned, officials were indicted, and San Diego lost its bondrating. Lowenstein warns that the pension wars that eruptedin Detroit, New York City, and San Diego are only the first. Buthe also recognizes that workers are entitled to decent securityin their retirement a critical problem as the country ages.While America Aged explains how we came to this crisis, and italso proposes a way out. Arming readers with knowledge of theconsequences of doing nothing, While America Aged, first andforemost, a call to action.