Moody’s to Factor
Pension Gaps in States’ Ratings
Published: January 27, 2011
Moody’s Investors Service
has begun to recalculate the states’ debt burdens in a way that includes
unfunded pensions, something states and others have ardently resisted until
now. Under
its new method, Moody’s found that the states with the biggest total
indebtedness included Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Massachusetts,
Mississippi, New Jersey and Rhode Island.
States
do not now show their pension obligations — funded or not — on their audited
financial statements. The board that issues accounting rules does not require
them to. And while it has been working on possible changes to the pension
accounting rules, investors have grown increasingly nervous about municipal
bonds.
Moody’s new approach may now turn the tide in favor of more
disclosure. The ratings agency said that in the future, it will add states’
unfunded pension obligations together with the value of their bonds, and
consider the totals when rating their credit. The new approach will be more
comparable to how the agency rates corporate debt and sovereign debt. Moody’s
did not indicate whether states’ credit ratings may rise or fall.
Under its new method, Moody’s found that
the states with the biggest total indebtedness included Connecticut, Hawaii,
Illinois, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey and Rhode Island. Puerto Rico also ranked high on the scale because its
pension fund for public workers is so depleted that it has virtually become a
pay-as-you-go plan, meaning each year’s payments to retirees are
essentially coming out of the budget each year.
Other big states that have had trouble balancing their budgets
lately, like New York and California , tended to fare better in the
new rankings. That is because
Moody’s counted only the unfunded portion of states’ pension obligations. New
York and California have tended to put more money into their state pension
funds over the years, so they have somewhat smaller shortfalls.
In
the past, Moody’s looked at a state’s level of bonded debt alone when assessing
its creditworthiness. Pensions were considered “soft debt” and were considered
separately from the bonds, using a different method.
“A
more standard analysis would view both of these as liabilities that need to be
paid and put stress on your operating budgets,” said Robert Kurtter,
managing director for public finance at Moody’s.
In
making the change, Moody’s sidestepped a bitter, continuing debate about
whether states and cities were accurately measuring their total pension
obligations in the first place. In adding together the value of the states’
bonds and their unfunded pensions, Moody’s is using the pension values reported
by the states. The shortfalls reported by the states greatly understate the
scale of the problem, according to a number of independent researchers.
“Analysts
and investors have to work with the information we have and draw their own conclusions
about what the information shows,” Mr. Kurtter said.
In a
report that is being made available to clients on Thursday, Moody’s
acknowledges the controversy, pointing out that governments and corporations
use very different methods to measure their total pension obligations. The
government method allows public pension funds to credit themselves for the
investment income, and the contributions, that they
expect to receive in the future. It has come under intense criticism since 2008
because the expected investment returns have not materialized. Some states have
not made the required contributions either.
Moody’s
noted in its report that it was going to keep using the states’ own numbers,
but said that if they were calculated differently, it “would likely lead to
higher underfunded liabilities than are currently
disclosed.”
After
adding up the values of each state’s bonds and its unfunded pensions, Moody’s
compared the totals to each state’s available resources, something it did in
the past only for each state’s bonds. It found that some relatively low-tax
states, like Colorado and Illinois, had very high total debts compared with
their revenue, suggesting that their finances could be improved by collecting
more taxes.
But
some states that are heavily indebted, like New Jersey , also have among the highest tax
rates, suggesting other types of action may be needed to reduce their debt
burdens.
Moody’s
also ranked total indebtedness on the basis of each state’s total economic
output and its population. It did not factor state promises for retiree health
care into its analysis, on the thinking that pensions are a fixed debt like
bonds, but retiree health plans can usually be renegotiated.
Mr. Kurtter said Moody’s was not suggesting that any state was
in such serious trouble that it was about to default on its bonds, something
considered extremely unlikely by many analysts.
Some
state officials have complained about a recent tendency to focus on total
pension obligations, calling it a scare tactic by union opponents who want to
abolish traditional pensions and make all state workers save for their own
retirements.
Mr. Kurtter said Moody’s had decided it was important to
consider total unfunded pension obligations because they could contribute to
current budget woes.
“These
are really reflections of the budget stress that states and local governments
are now feeling,” he said. A company with too much debt could close its doors,
he said, but governments do not have that option.
“They
have a tax base. They have contractually obligated themselves to make these
payments. These are part of the ongoing budget stress,” he said. “It ultimately
all comes back to being an operating cost. Addressing those problems is really what’s happening today.” http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/business/27pension.html?ref=nyregion