Bernie Sanders
Related: About this forumTeamster Retirees’ Campaign Against Pension Cuts Draws Support from Bernie Sanders
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/18141/teamsters-pension-cuts-bernie-sandersLess than six months after getting started, a grassroots campaign among Teamsters union retirees to protect their pensions appears to be picking up steam, attracting the support of presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and threatening to influence the outcome of the unions own leadership elections next year.
The retirees are demonstrating in the streets and barraging members of Congress in outrage over a slow-moving plan to cut their pension benefits. Such cuts were authorized by special legislationthe Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014 (MPRA)passed by Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama late last year. One leader of the campaign against the cuts estimates that thousands of union retirees could see their pension slashed by as much a 30 percent by the end of this year.
The campaign against cuts has seen a big change in the six months since we started, says Bob Amsden, a retired truck driver from the Milwaukee area. Since organizing work began in January, some 23 local committees of pensioners have been formed across the Midwest, he says. The work has been strongly supported by the union reform organization Teamsters for a Democratic Union, he adds, as well as by the Washington, D.C.-based Pension Rights Center. Some support is also building in Congress to repeal the new pension law.
In the highest-profile action yet, Sen. Bernie Sanders (Independent-Vt.) held a press conference June 18 to introduce repeal legislation.
If we do not repeal this disastrous law, retirees all over this country could see their pensions cut by 30 percent or more. We cannot let that happen. Instead of asking retirees to take a massive cut in their pension benefits, we can make these plans solvent by closing egregious loopholes that allow the wealthiest Americans in this country to avoid paying their fair share of taxes, Sanders said.
SamKnause
(13,114 posts)udbcrzy2
(891 posts)Multiemployer pension plans in "critical and declining" status -
http://www.pensionrights.org/publications/fact-sheet/multiemployer-pension-plans-critical-and-declining-status
MichMan
(12,001 posts)Many of these Multi Employer pension plans are administered by the unions. This legislation was lobbied for by the Central States Teamsters and requires that any changes to pensions be agreed upon by members and the Treasury Dept. While no rational person thinks benefits should ever be reduced, it was primarily some of the unions that lobbied congress and the President to pass this legislation.
There are other factions of the unions that are opposed, so this legislation has created an internal split within the Teamsters.
Currently, the ratio of working members and retirees is unfavorable causing the Central States plan to be underfunded. There are 5 retirees to every working member. This situation was exacerbated by an agreement with the Teamsters several years that allowed UPS to withdraw from the plan.
https://mycentralstatespension.org/news/central_states_pension_fund_and_mpra.aspx