Dead NY Cop Cashed Pension Checks for 28 Years Somehow

Check this out, especially if you pay taxes in
New York state, which ranked in the bottom third in all categories
of this 2014 Mercatus Center
study of
state fiscal solvency.

Dead men can’t cash checks.

But someone did for retired New Castle police Officer Joseph
Zwiefel. And the New York state pension fund lost $346,000 by
mistakenly sending him monthly checks for 28 years after his death,
The Journal News has learned.

The checks stopped in 2005 after one was returned by the post
office. But other than confirming the following year that Zwiefel
was dead, the state Comptroller’s Office did little investigating
into where the money had gone and has since run out of time to
recoup the cash.

His widow continued living in the couple’s Orlando, Florida home
but claims not to know what happened to the checks.

“Sheesh. That’s a lot of money,” Zwiefel’s nephew, Robert of
Patterson, said when told about the snafu. “They’re paying beyond
the grave now?”

More here.

Hat tip: Like a Libertarian’s Twitter
feed.

Public-sector pensions are underfunded by something like $4
trillion. To read more about that—and how to fix that problem—check
out Reason Foundation’s pension reform
work.

Why are public-sector pensions such a mess? Because they are
ultimately infused with politics. Watch and learn how Ventura
County, California residents weren’t even allowed to vote on a
much-needed pension-reform plan: