seriously. you read some of the things going on in this country and you really have to wonder how long it will be until the shooting starts

 

I just don't see that happening. I believe that the majority of folks will bend over and take it like the Greek.

 

Sounds kind of like social security.

 

Has that faint stench of austerity which is an inevitable unavoidable consequence of progressive liberal ideology. Cozy up to that smell...it WILL get worse.

 

How do you guys feel about pensions? Are the people "owed" their benefits?

Or is it a personal investment decision, and if the company folds/pensions mismanaged, your SOL? (Like say an unwise investment in the stock market)

 

I work for one of the largest communications companies in the world. I am hoping to get my pension as those before me have done for years. Just in case I don't, I've planned accordingly.

 

You can't get blood out of a turnip.

 

Pensions & 401K account collapses will be the biggest bubbles in the long term future.

Plan accordingly.

 

The legacy costs of many municipalities are way out of line and have forced property tax rates far beyond what many home owners are willing to pay. People vote with their feet and leave areas like that. Police and fireman pensions, in particular, are burying them.

Municipalities will have to file for bankruptcy to restructure and reduce their debt, the largest of which are the legacy costs. Retirees are going to have to take a haircut willingly or unwillingly.

 

<SNIPPED>
Municipalities will have to file for bankruptcy to restructure and reduce their debt, the largest of which are the legacy costs. Retirees are going to have to take a haircut willingly or unwillingly.

Retirees will take it in the rear while welfare goes higher.

 

I may be wrong but this pension was for private companies and not municipalities. Like I said, I may be wrong. I am in this pension and expect to see nothing from it by the time I retire. Thankfully, I am in another pension that is much healthier but again, I don't plan on it being there in 10 to 20 years. I hope I am wrong but fear that I am not.

I have a separate 401K and plan on it being a complete decimated as well. People better wake up and have plans B, C, and D.

It really sucks that those people are going to lose at large chunk of their retirement but that pension has been in trouble for a long time and the fact that cuts haven't happened yet is very surprising.

I understand the people don't want a cut but a cut is coming like it or not. There only so much money as most of the employers have either gone under or have done a massive buy out and moved their employees out of that pension.

Going to a much bigger picture, this is going to happen everywhere and to everyone. Also, like I stated, your 401k will take a huge lose at some time when people realize the stock market has been propped up for years thanks to QE by the fed and not on real growth by the companies.

Also, don't forget by the time many of us get our money out of the 401k the tax rate will be sky high not low as promised or understood by most. We are 19,000,000,000,000 dollars in the hole with the national debt not to mention unfunded liabilities. The government needs money and will take from 401k at some point. I believe sky high taxes are coming to those who will get payments out of their private 401k accounts.

Our economy and way of life are screwed.

 

This is yet another big government failure. Several important points:
- pensions are a promise made for future compensation for service/labor provided 30 years ago. If I do not pay my 360th monthly mortgage payment, I am in trouble because I made a promise that I would make those payments 30 years ago. I do not see the difference.
- if a corporation or public entity cannot make the payments and cannot find a compromise with the pensioners, then the entity should be required to file for bankruptcy, liquidate and pay the creditors the proceeds.
- employees are paid pensions. CEOs are given annuities and/or lump sum distributions. I do not see any CEOs complaining that their monthly checks will be reduced or eliminated. There needs to be a law that all employees be offered the same benefits.
- The Pension Benefits Guarantee Corporation (http://www.pbgc.gov) has 1000 employees, has been sucking from the taxpayer teat since 1974, and is nearly bankrupt itself. So much for another failed government safety net.
- if CEOs and Mayors make poor financial decisions, then when the poop hits the fan, there needs to be an ability to claw back their high salaries and forfeit their annuity/cash payment/retirement bonus. Over the years, dozens of major corporation CEOs have simultaneously announced both layoffs and their personal retirement (with the accompanying golden parachute). This should not happen in America.

 

Pensions are contracts and contracts are only as good as the people who sign them and even good people can make mistakes (like when the stock market crashes). Both my wife and I are dependent on pensions. We have watched both pension funds and those who control them, and we have since the beginnings of our respective careers. Both of the funds are more than 100% funded and could continue making payments to all contributors if they never received another dime. (This is absolutely no protection is the system falls apart and the dollar becomes worthless, but in that case, neither is a 401K or a 403b.) The key is to be out of debt including mortgages and prep. Remember, your TEOTWAWKI experience could be related to health or financial conditions that don't affect your neighbors. Lose your job or pension, and it's a pretty good thing to have food for the next year while you regroup.

 

VERY well said!:thumb:

 

As explained in response to another post, I decided to work for the federal government in 1968 and as far as I am concerned I entered into a contract with the federal government. I would do what I was hired to do and do it for the 25 years required to earn the pension they promised. I worked most of those years making less money than had I worked in industry. But my pension is paying off now. Yes, I consider it an entitlement. But I would not put up much of a fuss if my pension had to be cut AS LONG AS EVERY OTHER FEDERAL PENSIONER AND FEDERAL EMPLOYEE FROM ME TO THE PRESIDENT AND ALL MEMBERS OF CONGRESS AND ITS RETIREES TOOK THE SAME PERCENT CUT. Otherwise, I am going to be mad as hell.

 

From reading the article there appears to have been gross mismanagement on the part of the pension fund. The idea that they "suddenly" discover they are insolvent does not hold water. It was stated that the workers paid into the fund but some companies did not make their payments. If so why did the pension fund not immediately go after those companies before they folded?

I would also be interested to know what fees and "costs" the fund managers deducted from the funds. Although the laws and practices here in the UK are different, there are several funds with "black Holes" where the employer contributions have not been collected and the sums were not done accurately. I am currently a few months off having a small private pension fall in. The company I initially took it out with had been taken over repeatedly, changed its name at regular intervals and gone from a mutualised company owned by the contributors to a commercial company. The projected pension has fallen from £3500 to £1200 a year. The pension was a top up to enable me to ensure I could run a car and pay my energy bills. The stock market drop and the low interest rates are the main culprit here, not defaulted payments. It does bring home that even with planning, forethought and responsib;e behaviour you can be caught out.

 

Yes, those people are "owed" their pension. They accepted the promise of payments at a later date in-lieu of current wages.
There are several quick ways to improve this situation. 1st, The companies mentioned that did not pay into the pension fund should be liquidated and the funds paid into the pension fund. This includes companies that were "acquired" by other firms. If company XYZ purchased company ABC, they also purchased that companies pension liability. There will be an audit trail that can identify XYZ's assets and their position in the current company. It even may be XYZ sold ABC's assets and converted them to cash to fund XYZ. If so, it should be treated as a loan to XYZ and repaid with the appropriate interest.
2nd, All executive pensions for the companies and the union should be canceled and those funds should be added to the pension fund. The workers did not make poor decisions, they trusted the company and union leaderships. Those leaders should be treated as criminals and striped of all their ill gotten gains. That includes pensions, houses, cars, boats, vacation homes and any other asset that can be located and sold.

Until we actively and aggressively punish the thieves, and that is all they are; thieves, that plunder pension funds; this behavior will continue.

The next step should be do the same thing to Congress and the Executive Branch pensions and Social Security. Our elected representatives voted to STEAL from Social Security to fund vote buying welfare schemes. The Federal Pension Plan was established to provide the nuts and bolts federal workers with a comfortable living in retirement. It was not designed to fund retirement for politicians. Social Security is not an ENTITLEMENT! It is moneys the US Government forcibly to-ok for workers pay checks to hold in the Social Security Trust Fund to pay those workers a retirement check in proportion to the amount they contributed. Beginning with the Johnson Administration in 1964 the Government began funding the welfare programs with Social Security Funds. This violated the Social Security Act and was approved by Congress and the Supreme Courts. All of the legislative, executive, and judicial branch individuals should have their pensions revolve for stealing the retirement of hard working, honest Americans. Instead, we are rewarding thievery and praising the generosity of these thieving politicians.

 

Actually some very good points. I must admit that I was laughing a little throughout most of it though. Not at you but the thought that the Teamsters Union leadership or the Politicians will ever see any repercussions of their actions.

 

You are dead wrong! Your pension should not be cut. The pensions of the legislative and executive branches of the federal government should be terminated and those funds should be used to fund your and other workers pensions. It is those legislators and executives whose poor or down right theft that has damaged you pension fund. When funds were set up their was a specific percentage amount to be set aside to fund the pension program. In some cases this amount was reduced because, "the fund is so well funded we don't need to contribute at the prescribed rate, interest and growth will make up the difference." In other cases additional classes of beneficiaries were added without increasing the funding of the pension plan. Both examples were mismanagement and the individuals responsible should be help accountable.

 

The cuts are proposed.... this was the same thing they did in the city of Detroit - scared everybody with an impossibly big number like "50% cut", then, when the dust finally settled, it was around a 5 to 10% cut. Now, that is still horribly wrong, but I believe that was the target goal all along.

Scare the folks with a big cut number, and the small cut number goes down smoother.

 

Elections have consequences. Unions are paid members of the Democratic Party. The union in NV just turned out to put an incompetent hag ahead of a socialist. Most Democratic voters have not yet found out that free things are not free. But union members are now starting to figure out that all of their Democratic votes over the years paid for by higher wages and benefits cannot force states that are broke to honor promises made in return for their votes. I don't want to see any worker who put in a lifetime of work expecting a pension see that promise broken. However, the signs of disaster have been abundantly clear. Unions have driven many companies out of business. Teacher's unions have driven many tax payers out of their districts by raising property taxes while simultaneous lowering the quality of education. Public sector unions have put many towns out of business by extorting more than the tax base could possibly support. I also think that pension abuses led to the advent of the 401K and hopefully, all government workers will get one so that they can participate in the "rewards" that ensue when their political handlers tank the economy.

 

It's a tough situation, but there's no doubt that many entities (private AND
public) are on the hook for obligations they can't (don't have the means) to
pay out. Plenty of blame to go around-- haven't seen unions mentioned very much
in this thread, but they were on-board with many of the decisions taken in
years past (put simply, "the company/city will pay you those benefits later"). No
doubt, pension mismanagement, underfunding, misappropriation, and in some
cases outright theft have contributed to the problems.

I'm not the type to place big bet on "the end of the world as we know it," but
I do think that there are going to be a lot of adjustments going forward... e.g.,
the idea that healthy people can retire at age 62 and then draw a big check from
society for 30 years (give or take) probably isn't viable any more. E.g., I'm sure that
everyone realizes that when Social Security was first conceived, the life expectancy of
men was ~58 yrs. So paying a pension from age 62 was viable... nowadays,
with people living into their 80's, the math changes a bit.

Oh, people suggesting a "guaranteed minimum for all" can forget about it--
we can't afford to pay retirees what's owed them, let alone take on a massive
new entitlement.

My suggestion (applicable in good times or bad): plan on funding at least
part of your retirement yourself... if you're relatively young, that means
setting aside some of today's income for later; if you're already retirement or near-
retirement, and don't have enough saved, you might possibly consider part-time work
(if your pension/reduced pension isn't adequate).

My $0.02

 

Because math is just mean like that.:

At this point, it is pretty much a given.

 

Private sector pension funds usually depend on a return from the stock market. So when our economy goes bad the pension funds are among the first to feel it. I'm surprised so many funds survived seven years of Obama. If the next election brings a loyal and competent American to power (assuming he'll bring in more like him to Congress, state legislatures, etc.), the funds should start doing better.

Government pension plans are not tied to the economy, since the taxpayer is treated like a bottomless pit of money. If they could be tied to the economy, it's a safe bet government would not be so careless with the economy.

As it is now retired people are one of the most powerful voting blocks. If pension funds go bad in a big way, the socialist voting block will be greatly expanded, possibly to the point that the current government of California might seem right wing compared to what gets voted in nationally. The same goes for Social Security, but even more so. The kinds of things that happened in Europe and Asia in the mid-20th Century could happen here. Or something even worse. I think this could very well be part of the long term Obama plan.

 

Not a clean issue of socialism here. When the Fortune-500 off-shored manufacturing, and now much of IT to the communist Chinese, there could be no doubt that SS would be profoundly negatively impacted. IBM, for example, has more employees in India than the US now -- and obviously none of them are US taxpayers or paying into SS. This wasn't a mere "expansion" of the Fortune-500 to sweatshop and communist labor, but it was abandoning the US and its system.

I'm now an advocate for eliminating pensions altogether, of all kinds. People should be paid all wages up-front, and the labor market should adjust to that firm reality -- not some potential promise or even boldface lie. They should be encouraged to have a self-directed IRA, etc. but you can't trust an employer to do anything except replace you with a cheap communist.

As for the retiring Boomer voting bloc, sure they'll want alot more government benefits, way beyond what is affordable -- but as with declining union benefits to younger members, or raising the retirement age, they won't issue forth a new era of China-like socialism here. Rather, they will obtain their largesse on the backs of the young and from the future, as is their habit.

 

I paid into my pension plan and social security. Time to retire, both were cut in half. Guess the feds ran short on funding more illegals and refugees.
Social Security with what I paid in and the interest it earned, it was over $1,000,000.
I get about $8oo.oo a month now. rangerrick

 

Something is wrong. If you paid in the maximum, your check is ~$2600. If you elected to draw at 62, it's 25% less. Something is off.

Also, if a persons check is only $800.00, their Medicare and Medicare supplement is at no cost if you ask for it. (QMB Program.)

 

When SS and pension funds first started American companies were more profitable and the gov. didn't waste so much of our money on entitlements. Then liberalism took hold and American companies lost profitability. SS was raped in order to support a failing democrat party with votes.

 

This is why pensions can be disastrous and why most companies have done away with them over the last 30-40 years, they wind-up going insolvent either because of mismanagement or theft and then those receiving pensions wind-up getting royally screwed after working a good portion of their lives. Even if they take the 50% cut it will still go insolvent in 10 years and then they'll have nothing, if they don't take the cut it'll go insolvent in less than 10 years, either way they are screwed...

This is the main reason most companies have now gone to the 401K system instead.

 

I don't feel sorry whatsoever for those pensioners who have to take a haircut. If their pension came from the private sector, we're dealing with a union that was all too happy to squeeze the life out of the private companies they worked for. Auto and truckers unions are a perfect example.

If the pension came from a municipality, they were also all too happy to insist their neighbor work harder to pay for their lucrative and unreasonable pensions and benefits through increased property taxes, fees or levies.

We in the non-union, private sector have always had to scratch out a living and whatever pensions we could cobble together fell in times when the market plummeted. We had to deal with it and adjust our lives and our plans accordingly.

Those union and government pensioners were happy to live by the sword and, now, if they die by that same sword...so be it. Welcome to the real world.

 

Ever wonder why you constantly hear of SS being broke but never Welfare being broke? Why is one affordable and not the other since both are obtaining largess on the backs of the young and from the future?

In this usage, "broke" is used to mean, "having completely run out of money".
I.e.-- the entity once had money.

Social Security, in theory, was supposed to be funded by payroll taxes; so, a worker
pays in when they're young & working, then draws out (with some interest) when
they retire. For reasons numerous & longstanding, Social Security is now
projected to be unable to meet its obligations at various points in the future,
depending on who you read (see one example, below).

Welfare... well, generally speaking, recipients have never paid into any sort
of "welfare fund," it's always been a "gift" to the so-called underprivileged
("handout," if you prefer). So, unlike a pension fund, there's no "welfare fund"
to go broke... it all just comes out of the treasury. And clearly, there's some overlap,
e.g. SS aid to Widows & Orphans would be more "welfare" than a "retirement fund".

- - - - -

Also, keep this in mind when contemplating SS being "broke"--

"By 2034, there will be no Treasury bonds left. At that point, even though it will have used up the reserves it has been building up for decades, Social Security will still be collecting payroll taxes from those in the workforce. These will cover 75% of the benefits it projects it will need to pay out.

Granted, having three-quarters of the money you need is not an ideal situation. But it is certainly not “broke” or “bankrupt,” which are a couple of the misused terms tossed around to describe Social Security’s financial situation."
http://www.foxbusiness.com/features/2015/07/23/is-social-security-really-going-broke.html​

At that point, I see two likely possibilities:

#1. The government steps in and makes up the shortfall (most likely)
#2. Retirees make do with a portion of what they're owed (less likely)​

Of course, this presumes that SS stays the same and doesn't move on to
"means testing" or some other such scheme...

 

This fits the story to the tee. The Teamsters has defrauded this pension fund to the point of being unable to provide the full promise and they are asking for an eleven Billion bail out.

Didn't these workers live a higher life style due to the great wages and benefits the unions negotiated for them? Where did all of this money go?

http://www.kansascity.com/news/business/article62243962.html

 

The whole concept of pensions are innately flawed in at least two ways. Historically, I think the earliest pensions were often given to Civil War veterans and the widows, in an era when the average person was living well below what we would call the poverty line today.

But let's say the market is doing awesome, like it did from the 1980's to the latter 1990's, the only time it really did great. A pension in that time period would actually be providing less for you than a properly managed 401K might allow. Or let's take an ordinary situation in which the markets are moving sideways or down. Pensions in that situations are ultimately not sustainable.

So while I'm not smugly worth millions like Sierra, sitting on my rural acreage, etc. I agree that pensions are flawed concepts. Employers should pay their wage-slaves everything up-front, no deferred or "promised" future benefits that they may not be able to make good on.