"One of the mildly surprising things about the Stuyvesant Town debacle is the kinds of investors the deal attracted. What were entities like CalPers and the Church of England doing plowing their money in along with real estate moguls ... ? The answer is 'looking for alpha'. Underfunded pension funds have been looking for extra return in order to make up the holes ... and the problem is worst among public pension funds, because until recently, their accounting wasn't very good, so politicians were fond of making unfunded promises in lieu of wages."  MORE >>