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Comment Letter by American Benefits Council, Coalition to Preserve Defined Benefit Plans, and ERISA Industry Committee, to Treasury Department on Hybrid Plan Regulatory Issues (PDF)

1 page. "Given the significance of the regulations and the enormous effort Treasury and IRS have devoted to finalizing them, it is critical that administrative precedents (however inadvertent) not interfere with the government's ability to resolve the issues on the merits. Experience with past rulemakings counsels vigilance lest inadvertent inconsistency hamstring the government's development of its final regulations."

Text of Amicus Brief of American Benefits Council, ERIC and SHRM Objecting to Grant of Equitable Relief in ERISA Reimbursement Claim (PDF)

33 pages. "Instead of granting equitable relief that was an 'appropriate' means to enforce the terms of the plan, the court below granted equitable relief to rewrite the terms of the plan.... By contrast, enforcing written plan reimbursement provisions does not produce unjust or inequitable results. It merely enforces a rational and fair contractual bargain. The participant here received a clear benefit (immediate payment of his medical bills), and he knew that in exchange for that benefit he would have to reimburse the plan if he ultimately recovered monies from the third party who was responsible for his injuries." [U.S. Airways v. McCutchen, On Petition for Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, USSC No. 11-1285]

Testimony of Scott Macy at Hearing on DB Plans, on Behalf of ERIC, American Benefits Council, Others

19 pages; 10/14/03, presented to the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging. Excerpt: Today, I am serving as a spokesman for the American Benefits Council, the Business Roundtable, the ERISA Industry Committee, Financial Executives International, the National Association of Manufacturers, and the US Chamber of Commerce ... [who] come before you with a single voice to emphasize the need to preserve our nation's voluntary, employer sponsored defined benefit system.

Amicus Brief of ERIC and American Benefits Council in ESOP Fiduciary Breach Case (PDF)

37 pages. "By sustaining an imprudence claim based on these five generic allegations, the decision below would make it exponentially easier for plaintiffs to survive a motion to dismiss and proceed into costly discovery when bringing baseless imprudence claims against ESOP fiduciaries.... [T]he court below conflated the dual roles of the defendant fiduciaries and imposed securities law disclosure obligations on an ESOP fiduciary who also serves as a corporate officer." [Jander v. Retirement Plans Committee of IBM, No. 17-3518 (2d Cir. Dec. 10, 2018; cert. pet. granted Jun. 3, 2019)]

Comment Letter by American Benefits Council, Coalition to Preserve Defined Benefit Plans, and ERIC, to Treasury on Proposed Regs for Hybrid Retirement Plans (PDF)

3 pages. "[T]he anti-cutback relief should be unconditional for lookback and stability period changes made to conform to the regulations.... [A]ny stability period between the minimum and maximum period should be permitted.... [T]he plan's interest crediting rate should be permitted to be based on the returns on [any] subset [of plan assets], as long as the subset meets the diversification standard.... [The section 401(a)(26) regulations] should be clarified to reflect the recognition in the hybrid plan regulations that a plan's benefits can be based on the return on plan assets, such as by using such return as the plan's interest crediting rate."

Text of ERIC/American Benefits Council Amicus Brief on Damages Calculation in Cooper v. IBM

29 pages; click on 'Cooper v. IBM' link at bottom of target page.

Text of Amicus Brief of American Benefits Council and Four Others Supporting Deference to Plan Administrators on Interpretation of Plan Provisions (PDF)

41 pages. "This case -- which has now been to this Court three times and to the U.S. Supreme Court once -- raises issues of grave concern to amici and their members.... Contrary to the principle of deference that has long prevailed in this area, plaintiffs and their amicus seek to replace the construction of the Plan given by the Plan Administrator with the views of individual ERISA Plan participants; they claim insubstantial 'conflicts' that could be asserted with respect to virtually any ERISA plan; they attempt to ignore the Plan's content based on disclosure documents; and they claim entitlement to a remedy with no basis in the governing statutory and equitable standards.... If a plan administrator's construction can be denied deference based on the considerations plaintiffs and their amicus raise, it is hard to imagine a case where deference would apply." [Conklin v. Frommert, 2nd Cir.]

Text of Council/ERIC Amicus Brief in Milofsky v. American Airlines (PDF)

Council/ERIC Letter to Conferees on Transition Rules and Funding in Final Pension Reform Bill (PDF)

ERIC Urges Supreme Court to Reverse Appeals Court Ruling Rewriting Plan Terms in Equitable Remedies

"The ERISA Industry Committee ... along with the American Benefits Council, the Society for Human Resource Management, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on September 5 filed with the U.S. Supreme Court an amicus curiae ('friend of the court') brief urging the Court to reverse an appeals court ruling overriding the terms of a benefit plan in addressing appropriate equitable relief under [ERISA]... The Court will consider whether the Third Circuit correctly held that ERISA Section 502(a)(3) authorizes courts to use equitable principles (including equitable defenses to claims) to rewrite contractual language and refuse to order participants to reimburse their plan for benefits paid, even where the plan's terms give it an absolute right to full reimbursement. The Third Circuit ruled that such defenses can be used to override clear and specific plan provisions that set forth the subrogation rights."