Excerpt: Even if you don't work for an airline, last week's ruling by federal bankruptcy judge Eugene Wedoff -- permitting United Airlines to default on its pension plans, which cover more than 130,000 people -- should send shivers up your spine. .... While reducing the maximum United pension benefit from more than $100,000 a year to around $46,000 may not seem like a social disaster, the court's action may well mark the beginning of the end of the system of retirement planning as we know it.