The following letter to the editor appeared in the Feb. 3 edition of the Sacramento Bee newspaper.

Re "Sparks fly at CalPERS forum on pension cost" (Page A1, Jan. 30): At the recent CalPERS forum on pension costs and at several public appearances, anti-public employee critics have deliberately spread untruths and exaggerations about the pensions I and thousands of public retirees have earned and deserve.

For example, Gov. Schwarzenegger said in his State of the State address that public employees' pensions have jumped 2,000 percent in the last 10 years. The figures are a deliberately cropped picture. The "2,000 percent increase" compares a time when the state paid little or nothing to the pension system during years of robust investment earnings to the recent market cycle extremes and current economic downturn.

In 1981-82, pension contributions for the largest category of CalPERS employees cost the state 19.6 percent of payroll. For the current 2009-10 fiscal year, the state is paying 16.9 percent.

When erroneous or misleading information is repeated enough times, it can be perceived as the truth by those who don't take the time to understand the pension system or who need an easy target during these troubling economic times.

– Roger Marxen, president of CSEA Retirees Inc., Sacramento