The U.S. Census collects key data from selected state and municipal pension funds every year. State Budget Solutions consolidated the data for the 222 largest state administered defined benefit pension funds from fiscal years 2007 through 2010 to present an overview of each state's pension funds.  See how your state is doing.

Hey, young public employees, what are you going to do when your pension checks bounce after you paid in for decades? That is what will happen in many - maybe all - states and municipalities sooner or later if they do not reform right now. If you want to see the future, just look at Illinois. One citizen there did, and came up with a real reform plan that might work.

Public employees should take their pension money now and run to avoid risk of getting reduced benefits - or nothing - in the future. It's the best deal for them and for taxpayers. A growing chorus of credible voices including the Government Accountability Office, a Federal Reserve bank and now the Harvard Kennedy School Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government confirm state and local government finances are "spiraling out of control" and even draconian reforms only make it "more likely" that future benefits will paid in full.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland recently released three reports based on a year of research that show state and municipal finances are some of the "headwinds" that threaten economic recovery.

Hey, young public employees, what are you going to do when your pension checks bounce after you paid in for decades? That is what will happen in many - maybe all - states and municipalities sooner or later if they do not reform right now. If you want to see the future, just look at Illinois. One citizen there did, and came up with a real reform plan that might work.

This is what it sounds like when the Federal Reserve Bank screams: "Much has been written about the various headwinds restraining economic activity over the near term. However, our economy also has other headwinds to confront over the medium- to-longer-term. ... the finances of some state and local governments are also under stress and in need of serious adjustments."  - Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President Sandra Pianalto

Thanks to the Tax Foundation for calculating Tax Freedom day again. That's the day the average American starts to actually keep the fruits of our labor instead of slaving for government. This year Tax Freedom Day ironically is April 17, but the numbers crunchers at the foundation should be honest about which century.

How deep into debt have state and local politicians plunged taxpayers? Nobody really knows. The U.S.Securities and Exchange Commission is trying to find out, but a probe of just one state, Arizona, by investigative reporter Mark Flatten of the Goldwater Institute found more than $66.5 billion.

Even as actuaries argued at their annual meeting here about the exact speed of our public pension crash, how to slow it with the least economic damage and who is going to take the hit, U.S. Census finished compiling numbers on the top 100 municipal and state plans. Those numbers add up to catastrophe.

Here's our choice, America: Live or die on the toss of a coin. Or take the sure, safe option of guaranteed quadrapleagia for life. That's how one actuary phrased it when they gathered here Monday for opening session on the fate of public pension plans.

Finally, somebody who never could be accused of vast right-wing conspiring has stared into the fiscal abyss of our municipal and state pension crisis. The Hannah Arendt Center this week acknowledged the ruthless reality of arithmetic.

Anybody who ever questioned how many layers of corruption are woven into state and municipal pension systems, should take a look at the latest Government Accountability Office report on "Challenges of Hedge Fund and Private Equity Investing."

Since 2010 many states and municipalities have tried to control future pension costs, and a new report outlines their efforts. But it does not answer the $4 trillion question: Who is going to pay for benefits already earned when the money is gone?

Read beyond Page 1 in the most recent study of our municipal and state pension crisis and find the chilling truths that prove it is only a matter of time before those funds cannot pay promised benefits. When that happens - sooner for some, later for others, but inevitably for all -- billions of dollars every year must come from services, taxpayers, bondholders and beneficiaries.

Thousands of businesses planning to flee high-tax states and communities must be ready to conduct their own due diligence because standard affordability studies don't begin to show how extreme future tax hikes and service cuts will be.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana could set a national standard of honesty by pushing real solutions for their states' bankrupt pensions. Instead, they dangle mirages of reform that merely continues pushing huge costs - plus losses and interest - onto future taxpayers.

Politicians are setting up taxpayers and government workers for an even bigger crash by forcing retirement funds into risky investments, chasing gains required to pay promised benefits. That means trillions of dollars in higher taxes to provide no services or millions of betrayed public workers who will not get pension checks.

Why do state and municipal workers cling to those who betray them?
Here's an answer: The few getting rich off this scam use accounting tricks to lie about how deep the public pension crisis really is.

Taxpayers - through governments and public workers - pumped $25 billion into the top 100 pension funds in three months ending Sept. 30, according to the latest report. Those fund's managers paid out $52 billion and lost $199 billion in market value. How deep into the fiscal abyss do they have to plunge us before somebody wakes up?

They know they're trillions of dollars in the hole for false government pension promises, and that tax increases required to fill it are politically impossible, so state and local government union groups Wednesday proposed a two-pronged attack on beleaguered private-sector workers and businesses.