The brief’s key findings are:
- Pension and retiree health benefits for public safety workers are more expensive than those of other local government workers, largely due to earlier retirement ages.
- Perhaps surprisingly, though, their retirement benefits make up only a very small share of total local government spending.
- Some evidence suggests that public safety workers could work longer, which may have implications for plans’ retirement age.
- However, raising retirement ages would have little impact on government finances, particularly since it might involve higher wages to maintain a quality workforce.
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