HARRISBURG, Pa.--
Every second about the state pension debt goes up by $150.
Dauphin County resident and former state employee, Barry Shutt decided to send a message. He was showing a sign with the updated number each day and decided to do it more efficiently. Wednesday he displayed a real time debt clock in the Capitol.
"The thing goes up $4.5 billion a year and no one's talking about it," he said. "I got three grandchildren and I'm thinking why are they going to have to take the burden for this generation's screw up?"
He said something needs to be done to address the issue of the debt and it continues to rise.
"By the end of March this year, it will have increased to over $1 billion," he said.
State legislators said a solution needs to be achieved to stop the debt, which is more than $60 billion.
"The most significant part to any form of pension reform is attacking the principal and paying it down," Representative Kevin Schreiber said.
He said a hybrid plan of restructuring and possible taxes could solve the issue. Representative Stephen Bloom has a two part plan.
"Stop paying out or promising these overly lavish benefits for new employees," he said. "Pay off the promised benefits to people who legally and morally deserve and worked for them on the promise they would receive them and that would solve the problem in at least a faster way than what we are already seeing."
The debt continues to grow at a rate of more than 12 million dollars everyday.