Time to rethink U.S. retirement savings, Miller says. Read excerpt below:

October 23, 2008

By Josh Richman
Oakland Tribune

SAN FRANCISCO — As financial news for retirees and the soon-to-retire grows worse with each passing day, it's time for "a wholesale re-examination" of the American retirement savings system, House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller said Wednesday.

When Miller, D-Martinez, held a hearing on the impact of the economic crisis on retirement savings Oct. 7 in Washington, D.C., the Congressional Budget Office testified American workers have lost more than $2 trillion in retirement savings in the past 15 months as the stock market's decline decimated 401(k) accounts.

At Wednesday's hearing at San Francisco City Hall, Miller said it's worse yet: $1.9 trillion more has drained from public and private pension accounts, according to a new study from Boston College's Center for Retirement Research. For example, the California Public Employees' Retirement System — the largest U.S. public pension fund — has lost more than 20 percent of its value since July 1 and so might have to force already-struggling state and local governments to pay more for retirement benefits.

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