A new law in Illinois that cuts the pensions of teachers and other public employees amounts to a theft of these workers’ deferred compensation.

The law, if it survives legal challenges, also poses a threat to other public pension plans in the United States.

The legislation, passed by a Democratic Legislature and signed into law by a Democratic governor, reduces the annual cost-of-living adjustments that protect retirees against inflation, raises the minimum retirement age for younger retirees and creates a new 401(k)-type defined-contribution plan.

The reductions will close a $100 billion shortfall in pension funding, which was caused by the state’s failure for decades to contribute to its pension funds the money owed to retirees.

Now ordinary men and women who have worked hard all their lives will have to pay for the state’s negligence. Many retirees may fall into poverty.

The average pension for employees in the Illinois retirement system, including public school teachers except those in Chicago, is $30,000. That is all that most have to live on. Eighty percent of Illinois state workers don’t participate in Social Security because the state is supposed to cover employees through the pension program instead.

Current and future state retirees will lose thousands of dollars each year and hundreds of thousands of dollars over the course of their retirement under the new law.

Unions are taking Illinois to court, saying the law violates the state constitution’s protection of public pensions.

We hope they win, or other states with underfunded pension plans may try to follow Illinois’ lead.

Fortunately, the Teachers’ Retirement System and other public pension plans in New York are funded adequately. But we have seen the reasoning employed by Illinois used by Mayor Bloomberg in his refusal to grant retroactive pay to UFT members.

Bloomberg has failed to put money aside to cover raises for UFT members in the five years that they have gone without pay increases. Now the mayor argues that the DOE cannot afford any retroactive pay raises because there is no money.

We are arguing over the retroactive pay issue in our fact-finding proceedings for a new contract. In Illinois, meanwhile, the pension fight is headed to the courts.