You're on your own: "not only cruel, but stupid..."

molly ivins jumps on what i've been fulminating about for a while now - bankruptcy as a business strategy... she's coming at it from the pension-dumping angle and, as one who has had his (admittedly paltry) pension dumped onto the pbgc, i'm more than a little invested in the topic...

The latest corporate craze is for companies to declare bankruptcy, dumping pension responsibilities on the federal government and walking away, only to start doing business again without that nasty pension anchor around their necks. Your pension gets dumped to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., a government entity that ensures $2 trillion of pension benefits. The PBGC is funded by employers, who pay it $19 per employee annually.

$19 per year... now, THERE'S a bargain...! no wonder they're dumping...

This worked fine for years, until a bunch of steel companies and airlines declared bankruptcy. The Guaranty Corp. is now responsible for $62.3 billion in pension checks, but it has only $39 billion. Employer contributions have not kept up, so the PBGC now has a $23 billion deficit -- and chances are the taxpayers will wind up bailing it out, as we did the savings and loan industry.

[...]

There are several proposals now about what to do rumbling around in Congress. One I particularly like would forbid companies from continuing to fund their special executive retirement plans if their rank-and-file pensions are seriously underfunded.

[...]

[E]very one of us comes into this world naked and helpless, and most leave it in the same condition -- and we are dependent on one another every single day in between. The "stand on your own feet and take care of yourself" attitude the right wing keeps pushing is not only cruel, but stupid, too.

stupid, yes... cruel, yes... for you and me, not for them - "them" being the have-a-lot's who are hell-bent on being the have-a-lot-more's... stand on your own two feet... take care of yourself... i've got mine... screw you... social darwinism at its finest...

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