@techreport{NBERw2166,
 title = "Central Policies for Local Debt:  The Case of Teacher Pensions",
 author = "Robert P. Inman and David J. Albright",
 institution = "National Bureau of Economic Research",
 type = "Working Paper",
 series = "Working Paper Series",
 number = "2166",
 year = "1987",
 month = "1987",
 URL = "http://www.nber.org/papers/w2166",
 abstract = {The recent debt crises in New York City and Cleveland, the deterioration of public infra-structures in certain of our states and larger cities, and the occasional bankruptcy of smaller pension plans suggest that not all of local finance stands on a sound fiscal base. This paper examines the trends in funding for one form of state and local government debt--teacher pensions underfundings -- and asks what a central government might do to check any unwanted growth in these liabilities. The analysis concludes (i) that this form of state-local debt is sizeable and growing, (ii) that state and local governments have an implicit pay-as-you-go bias in pension financing which encourages the growth of debt, but (iii) central government benefit and funding regulations or debt relief policies can slow, or even reverse, that growth.},
}