Why end our pension plan? Because we CAN...!

if you're financially sound enough that the en vogue business strategy - bankruptcy - might raise too many eyebrows, you can STILL opt for the bankruptcy perk of killing off your pension program... why not take advantage of every opportunity to wring more blood out of the employees turnip as long as you can get away with it... never mind that some of them will be thrown to the sharks...

The death knell for the traditional company pension has been tolling for some time now. Companies in ailing industries like steel, airlines and auto parts have thrown themselves into bankruptcy and turned over their ruined pension plans to the federal government.

Now, with the recent announcements of pension freezes by some of the cream of corporate America - Verizon, Lockheed Martin, Motorola and, just last week, I.B.M. - the bell is tolling even louder. Even strong, stable companies with the means to operate a pension plan are facing longer worker lifespans, looming regulatory and accounting changes and, most important, heightened global competition. Some are deciding they either cannot, or will not, keep making the decades-long promises that a pension plan involves.

Companies now emphasize 401(k) plans, which leave workers responsible for ensuring that they have adequate funds for retirement and expose them to the vagaries of the financial markets.

[...]

Mr. Capelli [Peter Capelli, a professor of management at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania] called the switch from a pension plan to a 401(k) program "the most visible manifestation of the shifting of risk onto employees." He added: "People just have to deal with a lot more risk in their lives, because all these things that used to be more or less assured - a job, health care, a pension - are now variable."

and, if it doesn't all work out, tough shit for you, baby...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet