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May 7, 2015

The unfunded liability in the pension plans for federal government employees was $90 billion higher than the reported number in 2013/14, says a new report from the C.D. Howe Institute. In “Ottawa’s Secret Debt: The Burden and Risks of Federal Employee Pensions,” authors William B.P. Robson and Alexandre Laurin argue that the way Ottawa reports its pension obligations obscures the cost its plans currently impose on Canadian taxpayers, and leaves Canadians in the dark about how changes in economic circumstances cause that burden to shrink or to grow.

Alexandre Laurin

Alexandre is the Director of Research and leads the fiscal policy program and the pension policy program at the C.D. Howe Institute. He joined the C.D. Howe Institute in 2008 and became Director of Research in 2014. From 1999 to 2008, Mr.

William Robson

Bill Robson took office as CEO of the C.D. Howe Institute in July 2006, after serving as the Institute’s Senior Vice President since 2003 and Director of Research from 2000 to 2003. He has written more than 270 monographs, articles, chapters and books on such subjects as government budgets, pensions, healthcare financing, inflation and currency issues.