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Finally, the state is about to approve real pension reform

After four years of trying the state Senate’s Republicans may finally have the public employee pension reform they have been seeking.

The Senate passed pension reform Monday calling for smaller retirement benefits to newly hired state employees in favor of a 401(k)-style plan that most of the rest of the world lives by.

The difference between this plan and countless others previously is that it has the support of Gov. Tom Wolf. The governor has seen the impact the roughly $60 billion projected debt in Pennsylvania’s two big public pension system attributed to the benefits of the current and retired employees.

He’s seen the impact of that debt on the state budget, an impact that will last for the more than two decades it will take to pay down.

The Senate-enacted pension plan won’t reduce that debt, but it will keep it from getting worse.

Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman, a Bellefonte Republican, said if lawmakers had adopted the same changes in 2001 instead of a huge benefits increase the state would not be in the pension predicament in which it finds itself today.

There is no do-over for that huge mistake.

But this legislation presents an opportunity to prevent a growing debt as a result of the mistake. The House seems to understand that and on Thursday approved the pension reform legislation by a 143-53 margin.

That sends the pension reform plan to Gov. Wolf for an expected signature. It is not perfect pension reform, but it is, at long last, pension reform and that will have to be good enough for now.

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