The House Education and Labor Committee Wednesday approved H.R. 2989, the 401(k) Fair Disclosure and Pension Security Act of 2009. In his opening statement, Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.) remarked that the defined benefit provisions-both single and multiemployer-are "placeholders" for more comprehensive relief to be included at a later date. Single and multiemployer pension plans are seeking assistance from Congress to deal with the consequences of falling plan values due to the economic downturn.
With regard to multiemployer plan relief, the bill would extend the amortization periods for a multiemployer plan by five years.
Also this week, Congressman Earl Pomeroy (D-N.D.)-a member of the House Ways and Means Committee- released a "discussion draft" of various funding proposals designed to help define benefit plans, both single and multiemployer. The draft's multiemployer pension relief provisions include the following: 1) allow multiemployer plans to elect a one-time fresh start of the Funding Standard Account, with the sum of the outstanding balances amortized over a single 30-year period, effective starting with the 2009 or 2010 plan year; 2) extend the Rehabilitation Period and the Funding Improvement Period by five years; 3) facilitate the merger of multiemployer pension funds through the creation of multiemployer pension "alliances"; and 4) ease adoption of Rehabilitation or Funding Improvement Plan as the Default Schedule.
AGC is working with a broad coalition of multiemployer plan stakeholders coordinated by the National Coordinating Committee on Multiemployer Plans (NCCMP) to enact temporary relief for contributing employers who may otherwise face huge contribution increases, as well as to begin discussions on long-term reforms to defined benefit plans.
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