The Big Pension Makeover
When a state pension fund gets a *glamourous* makeover, public employees get taken to the cleaners…
By Mazinger Z
Few people personify the ethos of post-industrial, post-partisan, and post-scruples America like Gina Raimondo. General Treasurer of the great state of Rhode Island—which I am told by reliable sources is to be found somewhere north of Manhattan—self-described venture capitalist, a fanatical mathematics enthusiast, hedge fund darling and neoliberal Democrat—but I repeat myself. Now it is an unfortunate reality of our times that finance-preneurs like Gina inevitably attract their share of haters…
Cue hatersThere has been much hullabaloo about Gina’s investing Rhode Island’s $7 billion state pension fund she manages into her *own* firm, just because it charges enormous fees and has no public track record. OK—so it’s true that in the finance industry it is considered somewhat unseemly to directly pocket the assets one is paid to manage. One is supposed to set