{"id":6998,"date":"2015-01-15T10:50:38","date_gmt":"2015-01-15T16:50:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=6998"},"modified":"2015-01-15T10:53:42","modified_gmt":"2015-01-15T16:53:42","slug":"modest-pension-increases-projected-for-wrs-retirees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=6998","title":{"rendered":"Modest Pension Increases Projected for WRS Retirees"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB) <a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/151D2Qg\">announced<\/a> yesterday that preliminary returns for the Wisconsin Retirement System (WRS) should result in modest increases for retirees.<\/p>\n<p>The Core Fund, the state&#8217;s largest trust fund at $88.7 billion, slightly surpassed its benchmark with a one-year return of 5.7 percent. The five-year return is projected to be 9.3 percent.\u00a0The riskier Variable Fund, with holdings of $7.3 billion, lagged just behind its benchmark with a one-year return of 7.3 percent.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=6203\">Last year<\/a> both funds posted strong gains, resulting in the first increase for annuitants in five years.<\/p>\n<p>PROFS carefully monitors legislation relating to WRS and lobbies for the best possible pensions for faculty.<\/p>\n<p>In 2011, the legislature requested a\u00a0study to examine allowing WRS participants to choose a defined contribution plan or opt out of WRS altogether. PROFS <a href=\"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=3117\">hosted<\/a> a campus forum featuring experts on WRS, including the former legal counsel to SWIB and the former secretary of the Department of Employee Trust Funds.\u00a0The resulting 2012 legislative\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/2012-WRS-Study.pdf\">report<\/a> recommended <a href=\"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=3624\">no changes<\/a> to WRS.<\/p>\n<p>The state&#8217;s retirement system is very highly regarded &#8212; Morningstar\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=5843\">recognized<\/a>\u00a0WRS\u00a0as the strongest state pension in country, and the Pew Center on the States <a href=\"http:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=3567\">found<\/a> WRS to be fully-funded and called it a \u201csolid performer.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB) announced yesterday that preliminary returns for the Wisconsin Retirement System (WRS) should result in modest increases for retirees. The Core Fund, the state&#8217;s largest trust fund at $88.7 billion, slightly surpassed its benchmark&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link-p\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/?p=6998\">Read more &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[56],"class_list":["post-6998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","hentry","category-the-state","tag-wrs","post_format-post-format-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6998"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7010,"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6998\/revisions\/7010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/profs.wisc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}