PobreCarlos
Well-Known Member
JonFrum;
Let me ask you; are you maintain with your comment of....
"You claim "excess payments not credited to them personally before that withdrawal" were lost. What are you talking about? Everyone's account was current through the day of withdrawal."
...that ALL the payments that UPS made went to UPS EMPLOYEES PENSIONS? Remember, we're not talking about "ERISA regulations" here...but rather Teamster culpability in destroying the members employers, and thus their pension plans. You know, your "some truth" premise. Seems to me that those payments which were made in the UPS pensioners' names but for which they will NOT be given credit should be considered "excess" under any reasonable use of the word. Another term for it might be "funds that the Teamsters pissed away". That suit you better?
Again, READ THE DOCUMENTS! I know you're not a stupid guy. I'm also very aware by now that you feel you have a duty to defend the union's actions at all costs. But all the rehashing of the same ol' Teamsters saws in the world is going to change the fact that the Teamsters pension funds (or at least a large part of them) are on the ropes because THE TEAMSTERS PUT THE EMPLOYERS THAT SUPPORTED THOSE PENSIONS OUT OF BUSINESS!!!!
Lastly, before you get too uppity about Western States with me, you might want to recall that Western States (unlike Central States) is receiving - and has received - a rather heavy subsidy from UPS in the form of monthly pension payments on behalf of p/t'ers....the bulk of whom will NEVER RECEIVE A PENSION FROM THE FUND!! (call it another "shakedown", if you will). Those funds - which very well could go into direct wages for the affected p/t'ers, who otherwise will be completely crapped-on - or being used to prop-up the Western States pensioners of companies that, again, the IBT PUT OUT OF BUSINESS! I know that it apparently is too much to ask, but again, READ THE LYNCH TESTIMONY (or, more likely, admit that you HAVE by this point in time)
While you may not consider the consent decree to not having put the IBT in "trusteeship", the fact is that, effectively it has and is. Or do you deny the intervention rights of the court? Or the control which the Internal Review Board swings? Sorry...I deal in reality. You want to argue the point, then I suggest you take a look at the decree itself before presenting with another line of * in denial that there's an element of trustee-type control there..
I loved your spiel of...
"If the IBT does business with an investment house, or any business for that matter, it can threaten to take its business elsewhere anytime. It's a free country. But pension plans are a separate entity from the IBT and their Trustees can only legally do by majority vote what is in the best interest of the participants"
You DID notice, didn't you, that the officers of the pension funds soliciting the investment firms were ALSO officers IN THE IBT! And do you think their pressuring the firms for political purposes of the UNION advanced the effectiveness of their FIDUCIARY responsibility toward the fund's member PENSIONERS? I mean does it take very much of stretch to figure out that EFCA is going to HURT investments, and thus DIMINISH the pensioners investment as well?
And, again, I have to ask "since when has the IBT felt constrained by legalities"? YOU'VE got the link there. Since YOU are the one who is maintaining that there is such a separation, then why don't YOU report it to the authorities? Or is integrity something that comes hard for you?
Lastly, do you REALLY want to maintain that the IBT trustees were working in the UPS members best interests in terms of their pensions back in '97 when those same trustees - functioning as TEAMSTER officials as well - deprived them of the pension security that they KNEW was available to them? Security available OUTSIDE of CSPF?! Remember, per Sprague, the fund admitted that without UPS, it would be in a world of hurt; withdrawal, however, would NOT have adversely affected those members employed at UPS. Why? Because, even at that early time, UPS was making well more than 20% of the total contributions, while it's pensioners were receiving considerably less than that in return...and all that "excess" money would have been available to substantially ENHANCE UPSer's pension prospects. Now, however, it's been shot to Hell. And on what? I'd submit on the altar of Teamster intransigence and stupidity.
Sorry, "Jon"....but I deal in reality here. And the reality is that the Teamsters have destroyed the employers that supported them and their members jobs. And, in the process, they've gone a long ways toward destroying their pensions as well. No amount of dissembly is going to change that fact.
There was a time when the Teamsters could have "made a difference". They could have been acting in a collegial manner with employers and worked to PRESERVE their members' employers rather than handicapping them with almost every conceivable burden. They also could have made a concerted effort to organize the new firms that were coming in to take the place of those they destroyed .(again, I was told more than 30 years ago now by a Teamster honcho that FedEx would be organized "in a matter of months")...but no dice; the Teamsters haven't made a organizing effort worthy of the name - a RATIONAL organizing effort, that is - since before FedEx's coming into existence. And "yes", I'm aware of OVNT; note that I said "RATIONAL").
Too many Teamsters are like you in that they want to "blow" and paper the place with excuses instead of accepting responsibility and actually going about BETTERING things. And that's unfortunate. Because, you see, all the dilly-dallying rehash of crappola is not going to bring members jobs back, nor is it going to restore their pensions. Rather, people like you are actually going to have to do something POSITIVE for that to happen.
Let me ask you; are you maintain with your comment of....
"You claim "excess payments not credited to them personally before that withdrawal" were lost. What are you talking about? Everyone's account was current through the day of withdrawal."
...that ALL the payments that UPS made went to UPS EMPLOYEES PENSIONS? Remember, we're not talking about "ERISA regulations" here...but rather Teamster culpability in destroying the members employers, and thus their pension plans. You know, your "some truth" premise. Seems to me that those payments which were made in the UPS pensioners' names but for which they will NOT be given credit should be considered "excess" under any reasonable use of the word. Another term for it might be "funds that the Teamsters pissed away". That suit you better?
Again, READ THE DOCUMENTS! I know you're not a stupid guy. I'm also very aware by now that you feel you have a duty to defend the union's actions at all costs. But all the rehashing of the same ol' Teamsters saws in the world is going to change the fact that the Teamsters pension funds (or at least a large part of them) are on the ropes because THE TEAMSTERS PUT THE EMPLOYERS THAT SUPPORTED THOSE PENSIONS OUT OF BUSINESS!!!!
Lastly, before you get too uppity about Western States with me, you might want to recall that Western States (unlike Central States) is receiving - and has received - a rather heavy subsidy from UPS in the form of monthly pension payments on behalf of p/t'ers....the bulk of whom will NEVER RECEIVE A PENSION FROM THE FUND!! (call it another "shakedown", if you will). Those funds - which very well could go into direct wages for the affected p/t'ers, who otherwise will be completely crapped-on - or being used to prop-up the Western States pensioners of companies that, again, the IBT PUT OUT OF BUSINESS! I know that it apparently is too much to ask, but again, READ THE LYNCH TESTIMONY (or, more likely, admit that you HAVE by this point in time)
While you may not consider the consent decree to not having put the IBT in "trusteeship", the fact is that, effectively it has and is. Or do you deny the intervention rights of the court? Or the control which the Internal Review Board swings? Sorry...I deal in reality. You want to argue the point, then I suggest you take a look at the decree itself before presenting with another line of * in denial that there's an element of trustee-type control there..
I loved your spiel of...
"If the IBT does business with an investment house, or any business for that matter, it can threaten to take its business elsewhere anytime. It's a free country. But pension plans are a separate entity from the IBT and their Trustees can only legally do by majority vote what is in the best interest of the participants"
You DID notice, didn't you, that the officers of the pension funds soliciting the investment firms were ALSO officers IN THE IBT! And do you think their pressuring the firms for political purposes of the UNION advanced the effectiveness of their FIDUCIARY responsibility toward the fund's member PENSIONERS? I mean does it take very much of stretch to figure out that EFCA is going to HURT investments, and thus DIMINISH the pensioners investment as well?
And, again, I have to ask "since when has the IBT felt constrained by legalities"? YOU'VE got the link there. Since YOU are the one who is maintaining that there is such a separation, then why don't YOU report it to the authorities? Or is integrity something that comes hard for you?
Lastly, do you REALLY want to maintain that the IBT trustees were working in the UPS members best interests in terms of their pensions back in '97 when those same trustees - functioning as TEAMSTER officials as well - deprived them of the pension security that they KNEW was available to them? Security available OUTSIDE of CSPF?! Remember, per Sprague, the fund admitted that without UPS, it would be in a world of hurt; withdrawal, however, would NOT have adversely affected those members employed at UPS. Why? Because, even at that early time, UPS was making well more than 20% of the total contributions, while it's pensioners were receiving considerably less than that in return...and all that "excess" money would have been available to substantially ENHANCE UPSer's pension prospects. Now, however, it's been shot to Hell. And on what? I'd submit on the altar of Teamster intransigence and stupidity.
Sorry, "Jon"....but I deal in reality here. And the reality is that the Teamsters have destroyed the employers that supported them and their members jobs. And, in the process, they've gone a long ways toward destroying their pensions as well. No amount of dissembly is going to change that fact.
There was a time when the Teamsters could have "made a difference". They could have been acting in a collegial manner with employers and worked to PRESERVE their members' employers rather than handicapping them with almost every conceivable burden. They also could have made a concerted effort to organize the new firms that were coming in to take the place of those they destroyed .(again, I was told more than 30 years ago now by a Teamster honcho that FedEx would be organized "in a matter of months")...but no dice; the Teamsters haven't made a organizing effort worthy of the name - a RATIONAL organizing effort, that is - since before FedEx's coming into existence. And "yes", I'm aware of OVNT; note that I said "RATIONAL").
Too many Teamsters are like you in that they want to "blow" and paper the place with excuses instead of accepting responsibility and actually going about BETTERING things. And that's unfortunate. Because, you see, all the dilly-dallying rehash of crappola is not going to bring members jobs back, nor is it going to restore their pensions. Rather, people like you are actually going to have to do something POSITIVE for that to happen.