Consider the source - this lawyer represents BUSINESS, not workers in any regards, especially multiemployer pension plan issues. If he had, he would not have posted his editorial in National Law Review as a provocative invitation for Congress to consider composite plans because he 'believes' unions are not going to oppose them after MPRA failed for Central States. This lawyer does NOT represent our positions on these plans, nor does he speak the whole story about MPRA, where it came from, and who wrote it, and what it was to be all about. It was to be both MPRA first and then it was to include a COMPOSiTE PLAN, designed in the mind of Randy DeFrehn and his group coalescing under the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer plans. So much so that even the assumptions that Central States used and that Treasury rejected so soundly, were the brain child of DeFrehn, who REFUSED to allow even the QUESTION being raised about the 7.5 % assumptions used in its' planning. Information on both of them are very easily found on the internet under "Solutions not Bailouts"which is a good read because it's everything that we are seeing in article after article criticizing the opposition to MPRA. MPRA'S debut was before Congress two years before it was INSERTED INTO the Omnibus Spending Bill rushed through Congress in December of 2014. Congress didn't want to TOUCH IT when it was presented earlier, nor would they if it had seen the light of day like a 'bill' should do. It is duly noted that even the 'Impact Statements' which everyone fought so handily for, are right there inside of "Solutions not Bailouts", and those very statements were part of why so many fought back againt Central State's application, after they had time to read what costs MPRA could have on so many different states and local governments, as well as our national systems.What Happens to Multiemployer Pension Plan Reform Now? The Treasury Department’s Rejection of Central States Fund’s Application and the Future of Multiemployer Pension Plan Reform.
http://www.natlawreview.com/article...pension-plan-reform-now-treasury-department-s
Thanks for the post! I had not heard of a "composite plan" before. Since reading your post I've googled around a bit. There doesn't appear to me however to be a floor of 120 percent of the PBGC insured amount. It is even worst. The 120 percent figure as I understand it only applies to the amount that the pension plan itself is funded. Central States funding ratio is less than half that. As I understand this composite thing since there is no floor and no PBCG insurance there is no telling how much a pensioners payment may be reduced under this proposal. The proposal allows for a reduction in "core" retirement benefits but I see no limit on the allowed reduction. Thanks again for the information.Consider the source - this lawyer represents BUSINESS, not workers in any regards, especially multiemployer pension plan issues. If he had, he would not have posted his editorial in National Law Review as a provocative invitation for Congress to consider composite plans because he 'believes' unions are not going to oppose them after MPRA failed for Central States. This lawyer does NOT represent our positions on these plans, nor does he speak the whole story about MPRA, where it came from, and who wrote it, and what it was to be all about. It was to be both MPRA first and then it was to include a COMPOSiTE PLAN, designed in the mind of Randy DeFrehn and his group coalescing under the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer plans. So much so that even the assumptions that Central States used and that Treasury rejected so soundly, were the brain child of DeFrehn, who REFUSED to allow even the QUESTION being raised about the 7.5 % assumptions used in its' planning. Information on both of them are very easily found on the internet under "Solutions not Bailouts"which is a good read because it's everything that we are seeing in article after article criticizing the opposition to MPRA. MPRA'S debut was before Congress two years before it was INSERTED INTO the Omnibus Spending Bill rushed through Congress in December of 2014. Congress didn't want to TOUCH IT when it was presented earlier, nor would they if it had seen the light of day like a 'bill' should do. It is duly noted that even the 'Impact Statements' which everyone fought so handily for, are right there inside of "Solutions not Bailouts", and those very statements were part of why so many fought back againt Central State's application, after they had time to read what costs MPRA could have on so many different states and local governments, as well as our national systems.
This article is trying to provoke Congress to act and change our pension plans. A composite plan is presently ILLEGAL, just as MPRA was ILLEGAL until John Kline made it legal with his backroom dealings. He has PROMISED to write a bill allowing composite plans - search anywhere on the internet for quotes that he has promised Randy DeFrehn and the National Coordinating Committee on Multiemployer Plans to 'get it done'. This means, most likely, a lame duck session and another insertion into legislation that nobody knows about. We need our representatives to hear our voices on this as loud and clear as we made them in opposing MPRA for us under Central States. A composite plan represents the WORST possible aspects of both a defined benefit plan (a plan that gives a worker a certain amount after retirement based on labor contracts with employers who agree to pay the agreed amount) and a defined contribution plan (a plan that assures only how much will be contributed - NOT how much will be waiting for you at retirement). The composite plan, as did MPRA, REMOVES our protection under the PBGC FOREVER. Nada, nothing - NO safety net if employers or companies renege on their agreements by filing bankruptcy and opening the next day as a non-union carrier. No fiduciary protections if they do 'funny things' with OUR money. Both remove our right to sue, holding both the employer, the investor and investment manager harmless from their acts. This is the removal of our RIGHT BY LAW! Don't EVER AGREE TO THIS! The difference between this and MPRA - is that they agree to pay 120% of what the PBGC would pay in a failure. REMEMBER: The PBGC only guarantees about $1,200 at Best per month to a retiree under a multiemployer plan. The guaranteed amount under a composite plan is only 10% more than MPRA promised, which was 110%. We all remember just what those numbers were on our letters from Central States. There are few of us who even knew anybody who was getting less than a 50% cut. The deal here is - the employers, DeFrehn, Nyhan, Josh Gotbaum and Kline (ALL of those that wrote MPRA, which emanated from "Solutions not Bailouts") and everyone BUT the retirees and employees DO NOT WANT TO FUND the PBGC and pay the premiums that would raise our level of protections by raising premiums in our union contracts to the amounts the PBGC pays to a single employer retiree if their plan fails - the difference is tens and tens of thousands of dollars more should their plan fail. In other words: the premiums that were paid on our behalf mean nothing. The PBGC isn't funded properly, the employer and trustees don't want to pay larger premiums on our behalf, they want it ALL in THEIR FAVOR. They don't want to protect US, they don't want to pay the premiums that would ASSURE that the PBGC protect us to the levels they protect EVERYONE ELSE in SINGLE EMPLOYER PENSION PLANS. Who ever thought that our HUGE plan would ever need this sort of protection?? WHY DIDN'T THOSE THAT NEGOTIATED OUR CONTRACTS EVER ASK THAT QUESTION, OR PREPARE for this POSSIBILITY??? WHY? Whose backs were they covering and hiding behind?
OPPOSE, OPPOSE, OPPOSE - if there is going to be a change in pension plans we need representation at that table! If we are left with a legacy plan believing we will be set aside and taken care of this is NOT true. The premiums and funding will NOT GO INTO THE LEGACY FUND and it will RUN OUT OF MONEY! And once we agree to a composite plan, we have agreed to have NO PROTECTION. No argument. No legal leg to stand on when we wake up and find out we have been duped and ALL OF OUR EARNED PENSIONS will disappear. This is what they meant when they promised that it would be worse if we opposed. We won that fight and we DID oppose and we and Treasury exposed ALL OF THEM that were planning against us with their unattainable 'sustainability for 50 years' story.. The fairy tales that we have been accused of believing in are those that the team that built MPRA was WRITTEN BY the following: Randy DeFrehn (lobbyist) Thomas Nyhan (history will define what he is called), John Kline (a self-serving, union hating congressman from MN-R who admitted that he snuck this into the Omnibus Bill because that is the 'only way he could get it done', now he is leaving and has promised to 'get it done again' and REMOVE OUR PENSION PLANS AND REPLACE THEM WITH WHAT IS NOW ILLEGAL - a COMPOSITE PLAN. He has 4 months left before he retires to his outrageous 6 figure per year pension financed by OUR government. Josh Gottbaum is the 4th head of the greedy alliance and he quickly helped write MPRA and then left being the head of the PB&G and went to the Brookings Institute, where he is a paid LOBBYIST for anyone BUT our side! We ALL need to Wake up and smell the coffee. There is a MOVEMENT afoot and it can't get it's momentum BECAUSE of our recent VICTORY. We still have more battles to fight and THIS IS IT. WATCH OUT for the deceit and arm yourself with the KNOWLEDGE and TRUTH of WHAT IS GOING ON. This country is being ruined by the super wealthy elite who seek to remove all powers and protections the middle class has fought for and won by the sweat of OUR brows! Don't be lax, don't quit, don't give up - STAND UP AND BE COUNTED! We are 10,000,000 of us in these pension plans. UNITE UNDER THAT. The mutual preservation of OUR EARNED PENSIONS - ALL of OUR PENSIONS - LEGAL AGREEMENTS SIGNED and SEALED which USED TO MEAN SOMETHING. Have we lost our sense of fairness? NO! Have we lost our voices? NO! Have we got arms and legs? YES! Use all of your tools to fight back. FIGHT BACK. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. REMEMBER THIS. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. ARM YOURSELVES WITH IT so you UNDERSTAND what they are DOING. We have the numbers. They don't! We have coalesced into a remarkable force. KEEP HOLDING GROUND and don't let them throw you off. STAND STRONG. HOLD GROUND. LEARN. SPEAK UP. Call YOUR Congressmen and Congresswomen. You put them in office. You can remove them. They know it. They NEED YOU TO BACK THEM when they take OUR SIDE. ADVISE THEM. TELL THEM THAT YOU ARE BEHIND THEM IF THEY FIGHT FOR YOU! Simple. Take up your arms and your tools - KNOWLEDGE. VOICE. FREE SPEECH which is currently protected. USE IT! Tell everybody what you know - call your fellow retirees, your fellow workers, your other union brothers and sisters. Let them know! We are ALL STRONGER TOGETHER! Thank you. EVERYONE.
Thats not true. Lots of current worker and ALL the companies want out of the fund. We want what was worked for. Our goverment was the ones that put us in the situation in the first place. They let bankrupt companies out of liability. Why is the workers pension the only thing that didn't get paid for when liquidated? No answer? Its cause the american workers are expendable cause people like you let them"the goverment" get away with it.If it was you getting the shaft you'd be pissed too.
I think it is a little late for you to get upset about bankruptcy law at this stage of the game. if you kept track of municipal bankruptcies you would know public pensions haven't lost a dime from bankruptcy. Was the government at fault with the other pension funds that have filed under mpra? I just think it is sad that people are letting themselves be used by the pension rights center and others of their ilk. their end game is a national pension system and single payer health care system. if you are for that good, but don't think they have any intention of getting you your whole pension though.
Pensions have lost money in bankruptcies! All those companies that went bankrupt still owed money to the fund. Companies only pay pension liability once a year. A company the size of ABF for example pays around 125 million a year. Lots of money have been lost to unfunded liability because of bankruptcies. Like billions. Prove that wrong.
bankruptcy judges have always put private sector pensions at the back of the line in a bankruptcy. except when gm and Chrysler took the bail out money. That was quite a gift the judge gave the U.A.W. pension funds. that's when the bond holders got screwed. they couldn't complain to much though because they got bailed out too. Since are democrat friend Jimmy Carter deregulated the trucking industry 80% of the companies have failed to pay their withdraw payments. why, we are the last creditor on the totem pole. perhaps 35 years ago you should have called your elected representative and demanded pension funds should be the first creditor to collect in a bankruptcy.
Totally agree
if the benefit paid from the central states plan is REDUCED AS PERMITTED OR REQUIRED BY LAW, This is straight from the ups contract jan 1 2008. they knew then mpra was an inevitability. Every one in congress Knew what was in the bill, Obama knew what was in the bill, the problem with mpra is it was a decade to late. Everyone look in the mirror if you want to know why something wasn't done earlier about pension funds. You all would have had a cow if someone proposed a modest pension change in 2006!!!!Consider the source - this lawyer represents BUSINESS, not workers in any regards, especially multiemployer pension plan issues. If he had, he would not have posted his editorial in National Law Review as a provocative invitation for Congress to consider composite plans because he 'believes' unions are not going to oppose them after MPRA failed for Central States. This lawyer does NOT represent our positions on these plans, nor does he speak the whole story about MPRA, where it came from, and who wrote it, and what it was to be all about. It was to be both MPRA first and then it was to include a COMPOSiTE PLAN, designed in the mind of Randy DeFrehn and his group coalescing under the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer plans. So much so that even the assumptions that Central States used and that Treasury rejected so soundly, were the brain child of DeFrehn, who REFUSED to allow even the QUESTION being raised about the 7.5 % assumptions used in its' planning. Information on both of them are very easily found on the internet under "Solutions not Bailouts"which is a good read because it's everything that we are seeing in article after article criticizing the opposition to MPRA. MPRA'S debut was before Congress two years before it was INSERTED INTO the Omnibus Spending Bill rushed through Congress in December of 2014. Congress didn't want to TOUCH IT when it was presented earlier, nor would they if it had seen the light of day like a 'bill' should do. It is duly noted that even the 'Impact Statements' which everyone fought so handily for, are right there inside of "Solutions not Bailouts", and those very statements were part of why so many fought back againt Central State's application, after they had time to read what costs MPRA could have on so many different states and local governments, as well as our national systems.
This article is trying to provoke Congress to act and change our pension plans. A composite plan is presently ILLEGAL, just as MPRA was ILLEGAL until John Kline made it legal with his backroom dealings. He has PROMISED to write a bill allowing composite plans - search anywhere on the internet for quotes that he has promised Randy DeFrehn and the National Coordinating Committee on Multiemployer Plans to 'get it done'. This means, most likely, a lame duck session and another insertion into legislation that nobody knows about. We need our representatives to hear our voices on this as loud and clear as we made them in opposing MPRA for us under Central States. A composite plan represents the WORST possible aspects of both a defined benefit plan (a plan that gives a worker a certain amount after retirement based on labor contracts with employers who agree to pay the agreed amount) and a defined contribution plan (a plan that assures only how much will be contributed - NOT how much will be waiting for you at retirement). The composite plan, as did MPRA, REMOVES our protection under the PBGC FOREVER. Nada, nothing - NO safety net if employers or companies renege on their agreements by filing bankruptcy and opening the next day as a non-union carrier. No fiduciary protections if they do 'funny things' with OUR money. Both remove our right to sue, holding both the employer, the investor and investment manager harmless from their acts. This is the removal of our RIGHT BY LAW! Don't EVER AGREE TO THIS! The difference between this and MPRA - is that they agree to pay 120% of what the PBGC would pay in a failure. REMEMBER: The PBGC only guarantees about $1,200 at Best per month to a retiree under a multiemployer plan. The guaranteed amount under a composite plan is only 10% more than MPRA promised, which was 110%. We all remember just what those numbers were on our letters from Central States. There are few of us who even knew anybody who was getting less than a 50% cut. The deal here is - the employers, DeFrehn, Nyhan, Josh Gotbaum and Kline (ALL of those that wrote MPRA, which emanated from "Solutions not Bailouts") and everyone BUT the retirees and employees DO NOT WANT TO FUND the PBGC and pay the premiums that would raise our level of protections by raising premiums in our union contracts to the amounts the PBGC pays to a single employer retiree if their plan fails - the difference is tens and tens of thousands of dollars more should their plan fail. In other words: the premiums that were paid on our behalf mean nothing. The PBGC isn't funded properly, the employer and trustees don't want to pay larger premiums on our behalf, they want it ALL in THEIR FAVOR. They don't want to protect US, they don't want to pay the premiums that would ASSURE that the PBGC protect us to the levels they protect EVERYONE ELSE in SINGLE EMPLOYER PENSION PLANS. Who ever thought that our HUGE plan would ever need this sort of protection?? WHY DIDN'T THOSE THAT NEGOTIATED OUR CONTRACTS EVER ASK THAT QUESTION, OR PREPARE for this POSSIBILITY??? WHY? Whose backs were they covering and hiding behind?
OPPOSE, OPPOSE, OPPOSE - if there is going to be a change in pension plans we need representation at that table! If we are left with a legacy plan believing we will be set aside and taken care of this is NOT true. The premiums and funding will NOT GO INTO THE LEGACY FUND and it will RUN OUT OF MONEY! And once we agree to a composite plan, we have agreed to have NO PROTECTION. No argument. No legal leg to stand on when we wake up and find out we have been duped and ALL OF OUR EARNED PENSIONS will disappear. This is what they meant when they promised that it would be worse if we opposed. We won that fight and we DID oppose and we and Treasury exposed ALL OF THEM that were planning against us with their unattainable 'sustainability for 50 years' story.. The fairy tales that we have been accused of believing in are those that the team that built MPRA was WRITTEN BY the following: Randy DeFrehn (lobbyist) Thomas Nyhan (history will define what he is called), John Kline (a self-serving, union hating congressman from MN-R who admitted that he snuck this into the Omnibus Bill because that is the 'only way he could get it done', now he is leaving and has promised to 'get it done again' and REMOVE OUR PENSION PLANS AND REPLACE THEM WITH WHAT IS NOW ILLEGAL - a COMPOSITE PLAN. He has 4 months left before he retires to his outrageous 6 figure per year pension financed by OUR government. Josh Gottbaum is the 4th head of the greedy alliance and he quickly helped write MPRA and then left being the head of the PB&G and went to the Brookings Institute, where he is a paid LOBBYIST for anyone BUT our side! We ALL need to Wake up and smell the coffee. There is a MOVEMENT afoot and it can't get it's momentum BECAUSE of our recent VICTORY. We still have more battles to fight and THIS IS IT. WATCH OUT for the deceit and arm yourself with the KNOWLEDGE and TRUTH of WHAT IS GOING ON. This country is being ruined by the super wealthy elite who seek to remove all powers and protections the middle class has fought for and won by the sweat of OUR brows! Don't be lax, don't quit, don't give up - STAND UP AND BE COUNTED! We are 10,000,000 of us in these pension plans. UNITE UNDER THAT. The mutual preservation of OUR EARNED PENSIONS - ALL of OUR PENSIONS - LEGAL AGREEMENTS SIGNED and SEALED which USED TO MEAN SOMETHING. Have we lost our sense of fairness? NO! Have we lost our voices? NO! Have we got arms and legs? YES! Use all of your tools to fight back. FIGHT BACK. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. REMEMBER THIS. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. ARM YOURSELVES WITH IT so you UNDERSTAND what they are DOING. We have the numbers. They don't! We have coalesced into a remarkable force. KEEP HOLDING GROUND and don't let them throw you off. STAND STRONG. HOLD GROUND. LEARN. SPEAK UP. Call YOUR Congressmen and Congresswomen. You put them in office. You can remove them. They know it. They NEED YOU TO BACK THEM when they take OUR SIDE. ADVISE THEM. TELL THEM THAT YOU ARE BEHIND THEM IF THEY FIGHT FOR YOU! Simple. Take up your arms and your tools - KNOWLEDGE. VOICE. FREE SPEECH which is currently protected. USE IT! Tell everybody what you know - call your fellow retirees, your fellow workers, your other union brothers and sisters. Let them know! We are ALL STRONGER TOGETHER! Thank you. EVERYONE.
