Feds take over of UNITED pensions

[serryjw]

Now I don't want to start a flame war but I am outraged by this. We have an obligation to pay pension of Federal/State workers. The are civil servants and part of their compensation is their retirement......BUT we have NO obligation to pay retiremnet for private industry.United is not the only major company in trouble. What happenns when GM goes to the Feds with the same deal? The country is hemmoraging thanks to Bushit's wars..How are we going to pay this? Sorry, if you want to raed the entire article you willneed to register..but you probably should be with the LAT anyway!

quote......
The nation's pension insurer agreed Friday to take over all four of the underfunded pension plans at UAL Corp.'s United Airlines and assume $6.6 billion of the plans' net liabilities — the largest such transfer of obligations in the federal agency's 31-year history.
The pension plans cover 121,500 active and retired workers, and United's agreement to shift the plans to the agency fueled talk of strikes against the carrier by one or more of the company's employee unions.
end quote........
Do you have a company pension that you are now receiving retirement from private industry or will in the future?

[Coastie for Truth]

1. FPBGC is an "insurance" program paid for

by "premiums" on the employer. Sort of like FDIC "insurance" on bank deposits (in fact very similar - with the same policy arguments).

If this "insurance" (paid for by "premiums" on the employer) did not exist - almost any recession could turn into a replay of the Great Depression."

[serryjw]

3. You are kidding?

quote........
Deficit in PBGC's Main Pension Insurance Program Stands at $9.7 Billion as of Midyear

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation's insurance program for pension plans sponsored by a single employer reported an unaudited deficit of $9.7 billion as of March 31, 2004, the midpoint of the agency's fiscal year. The program's 2003 fiscal year end deficit was $11.2 billion.

-------end quote....
Bushit borrowed from everything else...what makes you think this is solvent?
http://www.pbgc.gov/news/press_releases/2004/pr04_47.htm

[Coastie for Truth]

4. I never said "solvent" or "actuarially sound"

just that it was an insurance program.

Do you really think FEMA Flood Insurance - or California Earthquake Insurance is "solvent." I don't - but I rely on the "full faith and credit" of the US and CA taxpayers (and I do carry both flood and earthquake insurance)

The insurance business is very simple - can explain it in two ways.

1. Privatize the profit --- socialize the risk.
2. Take your money - make you sue them when you have a valid claim - run to Congress/State Legislature to avoid paying the claim - and put it on the taxpayers.

That's the American way.

[serryjw]

5. FEMA is the only agency I feel comfortable is

solvent since only about 6% of budget goes to natural disasters. 94% goes the COG in time of nuclear attack!
quote......
FEMA, the most powerful entity in the United States, was not even created under constitutional law by Congress. It was a product of a Presidential Executive Order. It is not an elected body. We the people have no say whatsoever in who runs it or what it does. It has a quasi-secret budget in the billions of dollars and does not involve itself in public disclosures. We don't even know what all of its plans are.
Predictably, Mount Weather personnel stonewalled question after question in two Senate hearings. The seven-level deep facility, built during the cold war years, has been expanded and is lavishly maintained by and for FEMA executives and national officials. One source reports that the agency has spent approximately 94 percent of its budget not on disasters, but on this and dozens of other mostly secret underground installations.
------end quote......
http://www.sfbg.com/nessie/6.html

[annabanana]

2. some time in the next few years

my hubby (after over 35 years of service) will be drawing one of those fed pensions you mentioned

I would hate to see his money spent bailing out a corp who's CEO's have feathered their nests with their workers pensions

but I also wouldn't like to see their workers screwed

SO there should be a big, mandatory pension insurance fund that ALL Corps have to pay into, so J.Q. Public doesn't get stuck with the bill. (And it ought to come out of those gross, obscene executive salaries)

[B Calm]

6. My ex crooked employer filed bankruptcy and turned our pension

plan over PBGC.. I'll probably never get a damn dime. Now the cheap labor cons are trying to do away with social security, and my 401K plan looks like a thief got into it..

[serryjw]

7. I'll be happy to share my Starbucks with you.......

n/t