MCAA and the UA File Joint Comments on Multiemployer Pension Reform

The UA and MCAA continue to actively press for balanced multiemployer pension reform this year. In a joint letter to the Senate, the two organizations detailed specific elements of compromise to ameliorate the damaging aspects of the recent Grassley/Alexander proposal. The organizations’ goal is to attain consensus compromise that gets multiemployer pension reform back on track for possible enactment this year.

In the joint letter transmitted to the Senate on January 14, 2020, the UA and MCAA outline the key elements of analysis and potential compromise. The letter:

• Continues strong support for the adoption of new plan designs such as Composite Plans as a key element in restoring options to ground the multiemployer defined benefit system in more sustainable models going forward as a viable option to conversion to defined contribution plans overall, as is prevalent now in the single employer system.
• Backs the PBGC partition elements of the Grassley/Alexander proposal generally, with some substantive and procedural modifications.
• Calls for substantial moderation of the proposed PBGC premium increases.
• Demonstrates the imperative need to moderate the crippling imposition of significantly detrimental mandated lower asset return assumptions in the near term.
• Backs the proposed new Zone status provisions, with some needed clarifications.

The joint letter also transmits the two latest UA/MCAA/Horizon Actuarial Services analyses of pension reform impact on UA/MCAA plans based on the comprehensive data in the MCAA/Horizon database of all multiemployer plans nationwide.

Joint Letter

Analysis of Grassley/Alexander Proposal

Multiemployer Pension Plan Reform Policy Issues