Hoffa and Teamsters Endorse Bill to Protect Pensions, Strengthen Multi-Employer Plans

5habits100

Well-Known Member
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters issued its support today for new legislation that will protect earned pension benefits for retirees and boost multi-employer pension plans for workers and participating employers. View photos from the press conference, here.
The “Keep our Pension Promises Act,” sponsored by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), will roll back provisions slipped into the fiscal 2015 spending bill approved by Congress last year that made earned pensions benefits vulnerable to cuts. The measure would restore anti-cutback rules so that recipients in financially troubled multi-employer pension plans will be protected from having their benefits cut.
In addition, the legislation creates a legacy fund within the federal pension insurance program, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), to help insure that participants from companies that have abandoned the pension system will continue to receive the benefits they have earned and depend upon. The cost to cover these retirees and workers will be covered by closing tax loopholes used by the very wealthy.
“Retirees and workers who have played by the rules should receive the benefits they were promised,” Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa said. “The Teamsters thank Sen. Sanders and Rep. Kaptur for taking steps to ensure the government repairs some of the damage done by big banks to these retirement plans.”
Speaking in support of the bill at a Capitol Hill press conference Thursday, John Murphy, Eastern Region Vice President for the IBT, said it’s about time elected officials came to the aide of working people instead of just corporations.
“Government actions like deregulation, bad trade deals and bailing out the big banks have all played a role in the pension crisis,” Murphy said. “The solutions to the problem should not rest on workers who have worked hard for their pensions.”
Founded in 1903, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters represents 1.4 million hardworking men and women throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. Visit www.teamster.org for more information. Follow us on Twitter @Teamsters and “like” us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/teamsters.
I'm glad you posted that because the TDU people didn't read it because it's in the Teamster Magazine
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
Which by the way is in worse shape than the pension funds.

Yup.

UPS did the right thing by withdrawing from Central States. They knew that this day would come and took steps to protect our retirees and, as a result, our retirees will be the last to have their pensions cut, if at all.

Why should taxpayers bail out a private pension fund?
 

Bubblehead

My Senior Picture
Yes and no. Cutting them a check without rewriting the rule book would have been disastrous as they would have burned through the money and most likely been worse off than they were in the first place.
...yet a 35 year retired Teamster doesn't deserve the same consideration?

What did these retirees do wrong?
Where were they remiss?
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
With retirees on welfare and public assistance programs.
Like you said about the banks, bail them out and change the rules to protect from it happening again.

A retiree with a pension who has to supplement that income with public assistance clearly did not financially plan for his or her retirement.

I agree that it sucks to devote 35 years of your life to a company with the promise of a substantial monthly pension payment only to have that dream wiped out by the realization that the company did not take care of their financial business.

I disagree that the taxpayers should be on the hook to make up any of that shortfall.
 

oldngray

nowhere special
A plan proposed by the socialist Bernie? I'm surprised you were against it. All a part of the whole redistribution of wealth and other people's money concept. I do agree if the government performs other bail outs then pension plans are just as deserving.
 

Bubblehead

My Senior Picture
A retiree with a pension who has to supplement that income with public assistance clearly did not financially plan for his or her retirement.

I agree that it sucks to devote 35 years of your life to a company with the promise of a substantial monthly pension payment only to have that dream wiped out by the realization that the company did not take care of their financial business.

I disagree that the taxpayers should be on the hook to make up any of that shortfall.
Neat, but it's OK for private businesses?
All Teamsters don't work for UPS.
We have many other vocations, like school bus drivers, who only make a fraction of what we make.
For some of them, the pension was their only viable retirement plan.
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
UPS had the foresight to withdraw from CS.

UPS pays taxes.

Would it be fair to use a portion of those taxes to protect the pensions of non-UPSers simply because their employer did not have the same foresight?
 
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