An Open Letter To Bernier Mayo - Lucas Barrett

Dec 31, 1969
Dec 31, 1969 Updated Jul 21, 2016
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Open Letter To Bernier Mayo

To the Editor:

Dear Mr. Mayo,

In response to your opinion article in The Caledonian-Record on May 1, "Half-way Is Good But All The Way Is Better," you described retirement incentives in a way that is too good to be true.

When I read the article, the first thing that I questioned was the idea of a "retirement enhancement" raise in the final year of employment. Although it is not spelled out in the article, I assume the reason for making a 50 percent increase in salary for the last year of employment is to increase the highest average three years of compensation used in calculating retirement benefits. This artificial increase of an individual's salary for the purpose of "retirement enhancement," is not fair to the thousands of other plan participants and taxpayers that fund the state pensions. The state has a number of safeguards in place to prevent this kind of pension rigging including a limit of a 10 percent annual salary increase. If the purpose of the increased salary is to increase retirement benefits, I warn you it won't work.