PBGC Multiemployer Plan Premiums Increased $1 for Plan Years Beginning in 2017

Flat rate premiums for multiemployer plans increased by 3.7 percent, rising from $27 to $28.

The increase is the result of the COLA escalator added to the PGBC premium mechanism in the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014. The next question will be how much more Congress may increase the basic PBGC premium to address the likelihood that PBGC’s multiemployer premium fund will become insolvent within 10 years, unless some effective way is found to staunch the growing claims on PBGC’s multiemployer insurance fund by the growing number of critical and declining plans.

The issues relating to PBGC premiums are separate and distinct from MCAA’s efforts in the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans’ (NCCMP) Solutions Not Bailouts coalition to gain enactment of greater options for multiemployer plan trustees to devise composite plan structures that will help avoid insolvencies in the future.  The composite plan options are merely options for trustees to consider; they are not mandatory and will be subject to individual plan fiduciary decision-making.

For more information, go to PBGC premium rates.