Millions of American workers’ retirements are at risk. Taking action today to solve the multiemployer pension plan crisis can save our families, friends, and neighbors from financial hardship.
Plans Are Already Failing
Hard-working American miners, bakers, construction workers, truck drivers, and musicians in communities throughout the country have planned their futures on the benefits they’ve earned through their pension. Today, through no fault of their own, their funds have been cut. Thousands nationwide have already faced severe cuts, and if unaddressed, 10 million people will no longer have access to the retirement they have planned.
Americans need an urgent solution. The Retirement Security Coalition urges Congress to take action now to find a bipartisan compromise. We cannot afford to continue on the current trajectory which will ultimately lead to the collapse of the entire system, the loss of billions of retirement dollars, and billions more eliminated from our nation’s economy.
How Multiemployer Pension Plans Affect Your State
States with plans that are currently failing
States with plans that will fail by 2025
What is a Multiemployer Pension Plan (“MEPP”)?
A multiemployer pension plan is an employee benefit plan that is collectively bargained and jointly administered by more than one employer and at least one labor union. The plans are generally grouped by industry or geographic area, and they exist for the purpose of pooling assets to reduce administrative costs and for advantageous investing. Employers pool money into a trust, and workers are then paid a monthly benefit during retirement based on the amount their employer put in and years worked.
There are about 1,400 multiemployer pension plans covering 10 million workers. Many participants come from the construction, small businesses and retail, manufacturing, mining, and trucking industries.
Many multiemployer pension plans are now in critical and declining status, meaning they are projected to become insolvent, or bankrupt, within the next 20 years. This would leave millions of hard-working Americans without the retirement benefits they planned their futures around. The plans have gotten to this point due to a number of reasons, mainly because unionization rates have dropped, certain industries have shrunk, and the ratio of active-to-inactive participants shifted dramatically over the past few decades.
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), a federal government entity, insures the pension benefits but is projected to become insolvent by 2025. If Congress doesn’t act quickly to address the crisis, millions of Americans will no longer have access to the retirements they planned.
To see where these plans are already failing, check out our map.