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The government offers stability and post retirement benefits, as opposed to cash remuneration. Neither of those have to be properly accounted for in dollar terms today, so this type of remuneration is useful for campaigning on “keeping taxes low today”.

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Pensions are notoriously under/unfunded, particularly in local governments. I wouldn't count that as a guaranteed benefit. It may retroactively be cut in the future.

> Neither of those have to be properly accounted for in dollar terms today

They actually are, at least for pension contributions.

>They actually are, at least for pension contributions.

No. The government exempts taxpayer funded pensions from laws about calculating pension liabilities, and so they use discount rates far above what non taxpayer funded pension funds are required to use. And even these liberally calculated costs are not even funded properly, because there is nothing stopping the politician from not kicking the can down the road.

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