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March 12, 2003 - 13,085 subscribers
Today's sponsor: Worldwide Employee Benefits Network
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Worldwide Employee Benefits Network (WEB) and Cherry Blossoms! Join WEB for the First Annual WEB National Conference featuring William Sweetnam, of the Treasury Department and David Albertson of Employee Benefit News Magazine, along with speakers from the American Benefits Council, DOL, the IRS, and some of the Nation's leading consulting and law firms. During the Conference, the First Annual WEB Benefits Excellence Awards will be presented at a banquet featuring keynote speaker Dallas Salisbury of EBRI. Go to www.webnetwork.org for registration information.
(Please visit our sponsors. We try to make sure their products and services will be of interest to you. Thanks! --Editor)
Can We Fix the 401(k)?
Excerpt: "In just a few short years, the 401(k) has gone from hero to goat. Here's how this savings plan became the key to retirement and what we can do to make the 401(k) even better." (Business 2.0)
Employees Bailing Out of Retirement Plans as Stocks Fall
Excerpt: "Three years of falling stock prices have left workers' retirement portfolios battered. So what are they doing now? Saving less for retirement. Just 73 percent of workers participated in their company's 401(k) retirement-savings plan last year, the lowest level since at least the early 1990s ..." (The Wall Street Journal via the San Francisco Chronicle)
U.S. Steel Running Pension Shortfall
Excerpt: "The three-year bear market has obliterated U.S. Steel's $3.3 billion pension surplus, putting one of the steel industry's strongest pension funds in a deficit for the first time since 1993." (The [Pittsburgh] Post-Gazette)
Bush Administration Drafting Proposals to Help Preserve DB Plans
Excerpt: "The Bush administration is drafting proposals to discourage companies struggling to pay for traditional worker pension plans from dropping them, the head of the [PBGC] told Congress [Tuesday, March 11, 2003].... The recommendations will be aimed at preventing financially troubled companies from transferring the cost of underfinanced plans to healthy ones ..." (New York Times; one-time registration required)
Text of Prepared Testimony at Finance Committee Hearing on Funding of DB Plans
March 11, 2003. Witnesses: Steven Kandarian, PBGC; Marc Schuler, Captain, U.S. Airways; Ron Gebhardtsbauer, American Academy of Actuaries; Henry Eickelberg of General Dynamics Corporation, for the American Benefits Council; and Christopher W. O'Flinn, ERISA Industry Committee. (U.S. Senate, Committee on Finance)
US Airways Pilots Appeal Pension Ruling by Bankruptcy Judge
Excerpt: "Pilots at bankrupt US Airways on Tuesday appealed a judge's ruling that permits the carrier to try and terminate their pension plan." (Reuters via the Washington Post)
Employers Form Lobbying Group for DB Plans
Excerpt: "More than 50 employers with defined benefit plans have formed their own lobbying group to do publicity about the DB arrangements and to try to head off overly onerous regulations. According to a news release, an early focus of the Coalition to Preserve the Defined Benefit System are the recently proposed age-discrimination regulations impacting a broad range of defined benefit plans." (PLANSPONSOR.com)
Text of Press Release Announcing Coalition of Employers Concerned About DB Plan Regulations
Excerpt: "In response to the U.S. Department of Treasury's recently proposed age discrimination regulations affecting U.S. retirement plans, more than 50 employers that sponsor a wide range of defined benefit plans, including pension equity, cash balance and traditional designs, have joined together to establish the Coalition to Preserve the Defined Benefit System." (PR Newswire via the [Minneapolis] Star Tribune)
European Union Backs Rules to Free Up Cross-Border Pensions
Excerpt: "The European Parliament on Wednesday backed plans to allow the multi-trillion euro pension fund industry to operate across borders, a move aimed at boosting stock market capitalization in the 15-nation EU. The law, part of the European Union's plan to build a single financial services market by 2005, should make it easier for fund managers to sell their products abroad and help large firms cut costs by offering employees a single pan-EU pension scheme." (Reuters)
Bush Tax Cut Proposals: Too Many Pennies From Heaven?
Excerpt: "This time around, even many Republicans are gasping for breath. As President Bush campaigns for his second big tax-cutting package in two years, he has sent out a barrage of proposals that are more sweeping than anything that even Ronald Reagan might have contemplated." (New York Times; one-time registration required)
Settlement Agreement Was QDRO Even Though Terms Were Vague and Delivered After Death
Smith v. Estate of Smith, 2003 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2289 (D.N.J. 2003). Excerpt: "EBIA Comment: ... [E]ven though this court enforced a QDRO that was delivered post-death to the plan eight years after it was issued, alternate payees should not delay in providing QDROs to plans." (EBIA Weekly)
Links to Items on Executive Comp, Benefits in General
Second Circuit Upholds Trial Court's Denial of Attorney Fees for Successful ERISA Plaintiff
Excerpt: "LEYDA v. ALLIEDSIGNAL, INC. (03/04/03 - No. 02-7408, 02-7496, 2d. Cir.) Appeals and cross-appeals stemming from an ERISA ruling, which denied attorney fees to plaintiff and held that defendant failed to comply with ERISA's disclosure provisions, have no merit and are denied." (FindLaw.com)
Commentary: Rehnquist Court's Fickle Federalism Hobbles Both Congress and the States
Excerpt: "As the [Rush Prudential HMO v. Moran and similar] preemption cases indicate, the Court's commitment to federalism is highly erratic. The Court's conservative majority may use a states' rights argument to strike down national actions, but the same justices may also be unsympathetic to state autonomy if it results in new state initiatives." (The American Prospect)
Plan Administrator Liable for Damages for Inadequate Delivery of SPD
Leyda v. AlliedSignal, Inc. (2d Cir. 2003). Excerpt: "[T]he employer's method of distributing SPDs was not 'reasonably calculated to ensure actual receipt of the SPD by all plan participants,' as required by DOL regulations.... [B]y passing up opportunities to purchase additional coverage, the employee had relied to his detriment on the mistaken belief (caused by the employer's failure to provide him with an SPD) that he had the same level of life insurance coverage as before the acquisition." (EBIA Weekly)
CEO Severance Deals Seem Bad for Business
Excerpt: "Congratulations, you're fired! Now you can walk away with more money than you were getting while working. It sounds like a dream, and to most laid-off workers today, it most certainly would be. But it is a reality for many CEOs. Even in these tough economic times, they are getting fat severance packages when they are shown the door." (AP via Yahoo! News)
Stock Option Vote Nears As Lobbying Effort Grows
Excerpt: "Far from the loud debate on Wall Street and Silicon Valley, the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which sets accounting rules in the U.S., will meet on Wednesday to decide whether to add stock options to its agenda. A project aimed at improving stock option rules will almost inevitably mean a proposal that requires companies to deduct stock option costs from profits, analysts say." (Reuters)
New Option Rule Has Key Backers As Panel Meets
Excerpt: "The group that writes U.S. accounting rules will have an important ally today as it begins considering whether to try again to require companies to count stock options as a business expense. The major accounting firms have reversed their positions from a decade ago and now support expensing options." (Washington Post)
Excerpts from new book on accounting for equity compensation
The NCEO presents excerpts from its new book Accounting for Equity Compensation. Authored by leading practitioners from Ernst & Young and Frederic W. Cook & Co., the book provides readers with a strong foundation in the financial accounting rules that govern equity compensation programs such as stock options. (National Center for Employee Ownership)
Newly Posted or Renewed Job Openings
Defined Contributions Technical Analyst
for Mellon HR Solutions
in NY
Retirement Plan Consultant
for Invesmart
in WA
Operations Manager
for The Glass Freedman Company
in MI
RIS/Pension Administration - Customer Service Representative (CSR)
for Pan-American Life Insurance Company
in LA
Retirement Plan & Benefit Compliance Specialist
for Fortune 500 Durable Goods Manufacturer
in NJ
Corporate Director of Benefits
for Multi Billion-Dollar Food and Beverage Manufacturer
in CA
401(k) Administrator
for Redwood Administrators, Inc.
in NJ
Newly Posted Conferences
(Post Yours!)
Pension Focus 2003
in MO
May 8, 2003
Pension Consultants, Inc.
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