House Passes Pension Motion to Make Employers Play by Same Rules as Workers

by Tula Connell, May 4, 2006

When a company pension plan is underfunded, workers should not be subject to more restrictions than their employers when it comes to pension payouts and retirement benefits.

That’s the basic idea behind a motion passed Wednesday evening by the U.S. House of Representatives.

Proposed by Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), the senior Democrat on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, the motion instructs House conferees to treat restrictions on corporate executives’ retirement benefits the same as they treat restrictions on rank-and-file employees’ pension benefits if a pension plan is underfunded.

Miller offered the motion because House and Senate negotiators are currently working out differences on legislation (H.R. 2830) that changes federal laws governing the private pension system. Under the House version of the legislation—authored by Republican leaders—if an employer allows a traditional pension plan (a defined-benefit plan) to become less than 80 percent funded, the covered workers cannot receive benefit increases, cost of living adjustments or lump-sum pension payments.

Passage of the motion in the corporate-dominated Republican Congress is worth noting.

But then again, it is an election year.

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