PBGC Woes?

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) published its annual report on November 15, 2011.  The report identified a record deficit of $26 billion dollars for fiscal year 2011, increasing by $3 billion its published 2010 deficit. 

Total PBGC benefit obligations grew at a greater rate than assets increased.  The agency’s current benefit obligations of $107 billion include known, or ‘reasonably certain,’ obligations, but do not include obligations associated with future failures.

Josh Gotbaum, the PBGC’s director, uses this shortfall, continued low investment experience, and increased plan failure to propose increased regulation and greater PBGC authority to determine premiums collected from employer plans.

Because PBGC obligations are paid over decades, it has “sufficient funds to pay benefits for the foreseeable future.  Nonetheless, PBGC’s obligations are clearly greater than its resources. We cannot ignore PBGC’s future financial condition any more than we would that of the pension plans we insure,” noted Mr. Gotbaum in the report.

No one wants to see the collapse of the PBGC – or the U.S. retirement system – but Mr. Gotbaum’s proposed fixes are not popular and are seen to address artificially inflated problems.

Agency groups, including the ERISA Industry Committee, the American Benefits Council, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce asserted that the change is a “non-event” and that the deficit is the result of “government-created artificially-low interest rates.”  According to the American Benefits Council, nearly 80 percent of the $26 billion deficit can be attributed to low interest rates, because low interest rates result in higher calculations of pension liabilities.  

American Benefits Council James A. Klein said, “In this instance, flaws in the way PBGC’s financial condition is reported makes the situation appear far worse than reality; and the deficit is now being used to justify an enormous premium increase and to convince Congress to give the agency sweeping new powers.”  The Council published Ten Reasons to Doubt the PBGC’s Reported Deficit, an interesting read that alleges apples to oranges comparisons and shrouded methods are overstating the PBGC’s predicament.

Few deny that the PBGC is in a unique position to help ease retirement concerns or that our retirement system is in need of scrutiny as defined benefit plans near extinction and defined contribution plans put investment risk on employees’ shoulders.

Still, will increased PBGC premiums and authority really solve the PBGC’s problems and strengthen retirement confidence?  Only time will tell.