Special Notes for Fiscal Year 2005 on Defined Benefit, Defined Contribution, and Other Postemployment Benefit Plans
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The fiscal year 2005 finance data for public employee retirement systems represent a break in the data series.
The data for prior surveys were overstated because of the inclusion of defined contribution and other postemployment benefit
plan (mostly healthcare) finances with those of defined benefit plans.
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The Census Bureau can provide only a partial accounting of the difference this change represents.
Our research shows, for example, that the fiscal year 2004 total asset data for public employee retirement systems with
total assets of $1 billion or more were overstated by about 1.4 percent. These systems with $1 billion or more in assets accounted
for 95 percent of all system assets in fiscal year 2004.
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The fiscal year 2005 data represent the financial activity of defined benefit plans only.
Future surveys will cover only defined benefit plans.
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Though the focus of the survey has always been only defined benefit plans, in recent years a number
of public employee retirement systems, especially the largest ones, expanded their scope to include more than traditional
defined benefit plans.
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Without completely recreating the fiscal year 2004 data series, it is impossible to know the exact magnitude
of the change.
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Direct questions regarding this issue to govs.retire@census.gov
