10 states spend more on public pensions that on al college education combined

Washington Examiner:

According to Chad Aldeman of Bellwether Education Partners, 10 states spend more on government employee pensions than on all public colleges and universities combined: California, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Oregon and Pennsylvania.

According to the Cook Political Report, eight of those 10 states lean Democratic.

"Like the insatiable Pac-Man, pensions are eating further and further into state and local education budgets, eating up dollars that could be spent on lots of other things," Aldeman says. "That's true for all public services, but higher education is uniquely harmed by rising pension costs." He says these 10 states are "near the bottom of the list in terms of responsibly funding their pension plans."

As pension costs continue to rise, higher education budgets will likely lose out to pensions, partially because pensions are politically harder to reform. Aldeman says higher education specifically is on the chopping block because universities can always raise prices on students, because there is a lack of federal incentives for state governments to spend more on colleges, and because few state constitutions mandate spending on higher education.
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In many cases these excessive pensions are the results of the corrupt bargain between the public employee unions and the Democrat party/  The unions use coercive dues to support Democrats who in turn negotiate with the unions for generous pension benefits and there is no one representing the taxpayers at the table.   The politicians increase pensions rather than current wages because it impacts future budget and will be someone else's problem to balance.