"FULFILLING THE PROMISES"

AN AGENDA TO RESTORE RETIREMENT SECURITY FOR MILLIONS OF OLDER AMERICANS

In recent years, hundreds of large companies have broken long-standing pension and health insurance promises to their loyal, longtime employees and retirees. These unfair practices are accelerating, rather than diminishing, and are undercutting the retirement security of millions of people. The Ad Hoc Coalition to Restore Retirement Security is working to:

Stop companies from breaking pension promises to older employees by unfairly changing plan rules. AT&T’s switch to a "cash balance" pension plan increased its operating earnings by millions of dollars, at the expense of long-service salaried employees who lost as much as half of their expected pensions. The AT&T employees are seeking support of measures to require companies to make good on their pension promises by giving employees the choice at retirement between receiving their promised pensions and those offered under any new rules.

Stop companies from breaking pension promises to older employees by their selling divisions. Halliburton's sale of its Dresser-Rand division seemed like a routine business deal, until employees learned that it would cost them the special early retirement pensions they had counted on getting. Although the employees continue to work in the same jobs for the new owner, Halliburton refuses to pay them their promised benefits. The Dresser-Rand employees are seeking support of measures to prevent companies from using the sale of a division as a pretext to short-change employees of their promised pensions.

Stop companies from breaking pension promises to older employees by reclassifying them. Just as thousands of Allstate insurance agents were reaching eligibility for employees' promised early retirement pensions, Allstate changed their status to independent contractors, and told them they would get a small fraction of their anticipated benefits. The action increased Allstate's reported earnings and infuriated the agents, who filed a lawsuit claiming that the reclassification unlawfully deprived them of their pensions. The Allstate employees are seeking support of measures to restore their full benefits.

Stop companies from breaking promises to retirees that they would pay their health insurance costs. Thousands of GM retirees accepted early retirement packages because they were promised generous pensions supplemented by lifetime health insurance coverage. Years into retirement their companies told them that "fine print" allowed the companies to cut back (and even cancel) health insurance payments. The GM retirees are seeking support of measures to make it unlawful for companies to change the rules after people have retired.

Stop companies from breaking promises to employees about the value of their company's stock. MCI/WorldCom employees believed their company officials when the officials told them that WorldCom was a sound investment for the employees’ 401(k) money. In fact, the officials knew that the company was in financial trouble and were selling their WorldCom stock. After the company collapsed, the employees learned that gaps in the law could prevent them from being made whole. The MCI employees are seeking support of measures to support proposals that would ensure full remedies for misrepresentations by company officials.