On October 24, a five-member delegation from the University of Delaware visited the School of Political Science and Public Administration. Its members include associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and the heads of the Biden School of Public Policy and Administration, the Department of Political Science and International Relations, the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice, and the Department of communication. The two sides conducted in-depth discussions on future comprehensive cooperation. At the same time, Dan Smith, associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and associate professor of Biden School of Public Policy and Administration, gave a report entitled " Problems and Prospects of the Occupational Pension System in the American Civil Service" at Huagangyuan, Qingdao Campus. The report was opened by Professor Ma Ben, who introduced the speaker and visiting team, and was chaired by Professor Han Ziqiang.
Dr. Dan Smith firstly introduced the general situation of the occupational pension system in the US, and then discussed it in the state and local governments. Occupational pension is an important welfare system in the US public sector, and it is also an important measure taken by the government to attract talents, which can at a certain degree support civil servants' life after retirement. Dr. Dan Smith mentioned that American professional annuities are mostly managed by trust funds, and more than 90% of state and local government civil servants have professional annuities. In 50 states, there are about 220 state-level professional pension systems, 17,500,000 participants and 7,900,000 beneficiaries. Occupational annuities are mainly coordinated by state government or local government and are borne by the local government. Most occupational annuities cannot flow between different states. At the same time, the number of occupational annuities in different public service departments is different. Generally speaking, the occupational pension of the police, firefighters and teachers will be relatively high, and those of general civil servants will be low.
Dr. Dan Smith also mentioned that professional pension does not enjoy tax protection. It mainly relies on local fiscal payments and income of trust investment , which puts pressure on local finances. Theoretically, in times of financial stress, the government will tend to reduce the occupational annuity subscription share to meet more urgent public service needs. In the long run, professional pension of employees in the local and state government faces significant challenges.
After the report, the teachers and students had a lively discussion on the situation of the US civil service system. Among them, "different attitudes on civil servants in Chinese and American cultures” and "new changes in the occupational pension system under President Trump" were particularly enthusiastic.
Dan Smith
Acting Associate Dean of College of Arts and Sciences, Associate Professor.
He studies state and local government budgeting and financial management. His research appears in Journal of Policy Analysis and Management (JPAM), Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory (JPART), Public Administration Review (PAR), Public Budgeting & Finance, and Public Choice, among others. In addition, He is co-editor of JPART, He has served on the editorial board of PAR. He also is Director of the Master of Public Administration (MPA) program at University of Delaware (UD) and a Senior Faculty Fellow in UD’s Institute for Public Administration. Extramurally, he has served on the Governmental Accounting Standards Advisory Council (GASAC), and he is the Immediate Past Chair of the Association for Budgeting and Financial Management (ABFM).
Previously, he was Associate Professor and Director of the Finance Specialization at NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. At NYU, he also co-chaired the Finance and Policy Planning Committee of the Tenured/Tenure-Track Faculty Senators Council, and he served on NYU Wagner’s faculty-elected Dean’s Advisory Committee.
He is Ph.D. in Public Administration in the School of Public and International Affairs at The University of Georgia.
