"One reality the Fed delicately tiptoes around is that public-employee union voter drives and campaign contributions coupled with general voter ignorance, apathy and low turnout can be impenetrable barriers to reform until it is too late.... Bottom line: Rotten state and municipal finances hit by pensions 'whose troubles with chronic underfunding predate the financial crisis' could threaten the economic recovery necessary to save states and municipalities from their rotten finances."

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