US pension funds are on the brink of implosion – and Wall Street is ignoring it

…private equity firms may have told their pension officials that their assets were worth much more than they actually are, all while the firms were skimming billions of dollars of fees off retirees' money. 

If write-downs now happen, it could mean that when it's time to sell the assets to pay promised retiree benefits, pension funds would have far less money available than private equity firms led them to believe. At that point, there are three painful choices: cut retirement benefits, slash social programs to fund the benefits, or raise taxes to recoup the losses…

https://www.theguardian.com/business/commentisfree/2023/feb/02/us-pension-funds-implosion-wall-street-private-equity