P.E. Hanson’s April 24 letter “Public employees, not public enemies” demonstrates the entitlement mentality and financial ignorance of many public employees.

Hanson wrote that “we answer and respond to your 911 calls, we plow your streets. We work weekends, nights, holidays, and some of us work in hurricanes and through blizzards.”

Spare us the drama. How about simply saying “we do the job we are well paid to do and we often get paid overtime to do the job we are well paid to do.”

Hanson tells us that “employer (taxpayer) contributions over the last two decades have made up only one-fourth of total public pension revenue. Earnings from investments and employee contributions make up the remainder.” If only it were true. He naïvely overlooks the $5 billion unfunded status of the state’s pension system. Who will cover the shortfall? Certainly not public employee Hanson.

Like most public employees, Hanson is uninformed as to why the pension system is almost bankrupt. It is due to ridiculously generous benefits coupled with meager employee contributions.

For example, a public employee who starts working at age 25 with a $30,000 salary and annual raises of 3.25 percent will contribute $74,425 to the pension system over 20 years, assuming a contribution of 9 percent of his annual salary. Then, at the tender age of 45, that employee can begin collecting a pension equal to 50 percent of his highest five years that will grow by the almighty “cost of living” adjustment every year for 30 years, assuming a life expectancy of 75. Thus, the employee who contributed a mere $74,425 to the system will receive payments totaling $1,230,000 if he receives annual 3 percent cost-of-living adjustments. This is unsustainable, unfair and unacceptable.

Plowing streets and answering 911 calls entitles Hanson to a paycheck. It does not entitle Hanson to early retirement on the backs of his neighbors. Nor does it entitle Hanson to bankrupt the state. In the first instance, P.E. stands for public employee, but in the latter two, P.E. indeed stands for public enemy.

JAMES COURNOYER

North Smithfield