When the House passed the most recent budget bill, it included a provision related to multiemployer pension plan reform. In my last post, I suggested it might be too early to count on anything being final in that bill until it made it into law. Well, go ahead and start considering it because not only did the Senate pass it, but President Obama signed it into law. And some professionals are touting it as the most comprehensive legislation affecting multiemployer pension plans since the Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendments Act of 1980.
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation has a component called the multiemployer pension insurance program which is, according to the PBGC, going to be insolvent in 10 years. The idea behind the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014 is that by making certain changes to multiemployer pension plans, and specifically to underfunded pension plans, PBGC finances will improve. Of course the first part of this repair is that the annual PBGC insurance premiums for multiemployer plans will double to $26 per participant in 2015, and increase over time.
