We use cookies to provide you with a better experience. By continuing to browse the site you are agreeing to our use of cookies in accordance with our Cookie Policy.
  • ::COVID-19 COVERAGE::
  • INDUSTRY PRESS ROOM
  • ABOUT
  • CONTACT
  • MEDIA FILE
  • Create Account
  • Sign In
  • Sign Out
  • My Account
Free Newsletters
  • MAGAZINE
    • Current Issue
    • Archives
    • Digital Edition
    • Subscribe
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • TRANSPORTATION
  • MATERIAL HANDLING
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • LIFT TRUCKS
  • PODCAST ETC
    • Podcast
    • Webcasts
    • Blogs
      • Analytics & Big Data
      • Best Practices
      • Change Me
      • Empowering Your Performance Edge
      • Logistics Problem Solving
      • One-Off Sound Off
      • Public Sector Logistics
      • Two Sides of the Logistics Coin
      • Submit your blog post
    • Events
    • White Papers
    • Industry Press Room
      • Upload Your News
    • New Products
      • Upload Your Product News
    • Conference Guides
    • Conference Reports
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • DCV-TV
    • DCV-TV 1: News
    • DCV-TV 2: Case Studies
    • DCV-TV 3: Webcasts
    • DCV-TV 4: Viewer Contributed
    • DCV-TV 5: Solution Profiles
    • MODEX 2020
    • Upload Your Video
  • MAGAZINE
    • Current Issue
    • Archives
    • Digital Edition
    • Subscribe
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • TRANSPORTATION
  • MATERIAL HANDLING
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • LIFT TRUCKS
  • PODCAST ETC
    • Podcast
    • Webcasts
    • Blogs
      • Analytics & Big Data
      • Best Practices
      • Change Me
      • Empowering Your Performance Edge
      • Logistics Problem Solving
      • One-Off Sound Off
      • Public Sector Logistics
      • Two Sides of the Logistics Coin
      • Submit your blog post
    • Events
    • White Papers
    • Industry Press Room
      • Upload Your News
    • New Products
      • Upload Your Product News
    • Conference Guides
    • Conference Reports
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • DCV-TV
    • DCV-TV 1: News
    • DCV-TV 2: Case Studies
    • DCV-TV 3: Webcasts
    • DCV-TV 4: Viewer Contributed
    • DCV-TV 5: Solution Profiles
    • MODEX 2020
    • Upload Your Video
Home » Central States trustees scrap idea of developing new pension-rescue plan
newsworthy

Central States trustees scrap idea of developing new pension-rescue plan

May 20, 2016
Mark B. Solomon
No Comments

A large and ailing Teamsters union pension fund that holds the financial futures of thousands of active and retired trucking-industry workers said yesterday it won't devise an alternative plan to rescue the fund and called for Congressional legislation to preserve workers' pension benefits.

The announcement by trustees of the Rosemont, Ill.-based Central States, Southeast, and Southwest pension fund comes less than two weeks after the Treasury Department rejected the fund's rescue plan on grounds the fund failed to show how the plan, which called for sizable pension benefit cuts that varied depending on a beneficiary's status, would take it off the track to insolvency. At the time of Treasury's decision, Central States trustees said they would explore their next move.

Thomas Nyhan, Central States' executive director, said in yesterday's statement that the fund would be unable to develop and implement a revised plan that meets the regulatory hurdles erected by Treasury. Only Congressional funding, either directly into the fund or through the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., the federal government's multiemployer pension-insurance program, would save workers' pensions, Nyhan said. Without Congressional action, pensioners may see that part of their retirement nest eggs dwindle away to nothing, Nyhan said. The fund has said that, absent any intervention, it will run out of money in less than 10 years, and that it needs about $11 billion to meet all its obligations.

Nyhan didn't address the merits of Treasury's ruling other than to say the alleged defects of the fund's proposal could have been dealt with at an earlier stage in the process than they were. The fund made its proposal last fall.

"The rescue plan was a proposal of last resort, and clearly not the option that the Trustees preferred," Nyhan said. "It was, however, based on a realistic assessment that benefit reductions under a rescue plan were the only available, practical way to avoid the hardship and countless personal tragedies that will result if the Pension Fund runs out of money."

Noting that many members of Congress called on Treasury to reject the proposal, Nyhan said that it is "now time for those and others who suggested that there is a better way to fix this critical problem to deliver on real solutions that will protect the retirement benefits of Central States participants."

As of year-end 2014, the 400,000-member fund's liabilities were about twice as large as its assets. According to a published report, the fund pays out $2 billion more in retirement benefits each year than it takes in from employers, and there are more than five retired members for every active member contributing to the fund.

The fund has been hurt by subpar investment returns, high costs, and perhaps most significant, a dramatic decline in organized truck labor. At its peak before trucking deregulation in 1980, the Teamsters had about 400,000 members in its freight division. Today, it has about 50,000 members. With unionized trucking eviscerated by bankruptcies and consolidations over the past 35 years, there are fewer employers paying into the fund to support a growing number of retirees.

This, in turn, has put enormous stress on multiemployer pension schemes like Central States, where companies fund the pensions not just of their own workers and retirees but also of workers at other firms that participated, including those that have gone out of business. The program worked well as long as there were numerous unionized truckers to equitably distribute the pension obligations. As the ranks thinned, however, surviving companies became liable for a larger share of the cost. That was the main reason Atlanta-based UPS Inc., a huge Teamster employer, paid $6.1 billion to Central States in 2007 to exit the fund.

Among workers whose benefit levels were preserved by Treasury's decision were 13,000 employees of Overland Park, Kan.-based less-than-truckload (LTL) carrier YRC Worldwide Inc., as well as thousands more retirees who worked at YRC and the old Roadway Express, an LTL carrier that YRC, then known as Yellow Freight, acquired in 2003.

Transportation Trucking Regulation/Government
KEYWORDS UPS YRC Worldwide
  • Related Articles

    YRC's unionized workers saved massive pension chop by Treasury's rejection of Central States plan

    Treasury rejects Central States plan to cut pensions; victory for truck labor

    Tentative ABF, Teamster contract calls for subcontracting of driver work, pension freeze

Marksolomon
Mark Solomon joined DC VELOCITY as senior editor in August 2008, and was promoted to his current position on January 1, 2015. He has spent more than 30 years in the transportation, logistics and supply chain management fields as a journalist and public relations professional. From 1989 to 1994, he worked in Washington as a reporter for the Journal of Commerce, covering the aviation and trucking industries, the Department of Transportation, Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court. Prior to that, he worked for Traffic World for seven years in a similar role. From 1994 to 2008, Mr. Solomon ran Media-Based Solutions, a public relations firm based in Atlanta. He graduated in 1978 with a B.A. in journalism from The American University in Washington, D.C.

Recent Articles by Mark Solomon

Coming together for road safety: interview with Joshua Girard

Off the rails

Freight rate spikes shaking up the C-suite

You must login or register in order to post a comment.

Report Abusive Comment

Most Popular Articles

  • A look into the future of robotics

  • Exotec Skypod System Adopted by Gap Inc. to Optimize Returns Process

  • Roadrunner Freight bolsters LTL capabilities with $50 million in new backing

  • A primer on warehouse robots

  • Truck driver availability tightens to three-year low, ACT says

Now Playing on DCV-TV

B56eecf1 4687 42a4 865e c3f3223925f7

How serious are you about controlling your freight costs?

DCV-TV 4: Viewer Contributed
If you’ve been feeling like your freight budget is under attack, you’re in good company! Whether you’re looking at the ocean, parcel, LTL, truckload, or air markets, capacity is tight and prices are soaring.RELATED RESOURCES:Rapid AssessmentVisit our websiteSubscribe to our YouTube Channel

FEATURED WHITE PAPERS

  • Special Report: Supply Chain Trends in Retail & Consumer Goods

  • Fortify Your Operational Resilience

  • Cold Storage Automation: Leveraging Advanced Technologies to Meet Increasing Demand

  • The modern warehouse: Maximizing productivity and capacity

View More

Subscribe to DC Velocity Magazine

GET YOUR FREE SUBSCRIPTION
  • SUBSCRIBE
  • NEWSLETTERS
  • ADVERTISING
  • CUSTOMER CARE
  • CONTACT
  • ABOUT
  • STAFF
  • PRIVACY POLICY

Copyright ©2021. All Rights ReservedDesign, CMS, Hosting & Web Development :: ePublishing