Florida Worker Pension Changes Are Legal, Court Rules
The Florida Supreme Court has ruled that changes to the public employee pension system did not violate the workers' rights. The changes require workers to contribute 3% of their salary to the pension system in order to close a budget deficit. The court ruled that the state can alter benefits for the future. Workers had fought the changes, saying that they amounted to a pay cut for employees. The changes will cover about 650,000 employees and are estimated to have saved about $1 billion in 2011.
See "Florida Worker Pension Changes Are Legal, Court Rules", Jef Feeley and Christine Jordan Sexton, Bloomberg News, January 16, 2013