For years, steep arbitration fees have made many employers think twice about contesting a questionable withdrawal liability determination. The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation’s (PBGC) approval of a lower fee schedule may ease that hurdle.

ERISA, as amended by the Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendment Act of 1980 (MPPAA), requires all disputes between an employer and a

            This is another blog on our monitoring the status of defined benefit multi-employer pension funds.  Since this author last wrote to you, it has been revealed that the Central States Pension Fund is scheduled to become insolvent sometime in 2025.  Worse yet, it has been announced that the multi-employer fund of the Pension Benefit Guaranty

Under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (“ERISA”), as amended by the Multiemployer Pension Plan Amendments Act (“MPPAA”), an employer that has assumed an obligation to contribute to collectively-bargained and jointly-administered defined benefit pension plans ( “multiemployer plans”) is liable for its allocable share of any underfunding upon the permanent cessation of that obligation. This

As many of you know, currently pending before the Supreme Court are consolidated cases from the Third, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits holding that, for religiously affiliated employers, employee benefits plans must initially be established by a church for the plans to be exempt from ERISA as “church plans.” The circuit courts issued these holdings when,

We have been monitoring and reporting on several disquieting events which have occurred in the multi-employer pension plan world within the past few months.

In September 2015, the Central States Southeast and Southwest Area Pension Fund availed itself of the relief permitted under the Kline-Miller Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014 (“Kline-Miller Act”) by applying

As part of on-going efforts to prevent the collapse of financially troubled multiemployer pension plans, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (“PBGC”) and Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) have issued regulatory guidance under the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014 (“MPRA”). Together, the Treasury Proposed and Temporary Regulations, a new Revenue Ruling, and PBGC interim rule