US. House approves loan program for troubled pension plans
The House voted 264-169 on Wednesday to pass legislation that would create a new Treasury Department agency to provide taxpayer-backed loans to endangered multiemployer pension plans and some other types of endangered plans.
The loans would be distributed by a Pension Rehabilitation Administration and would go to programs listed in “critical and declining” status by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the federal agency that insures the plans.
The bill, which is dubbed the Rehabilitation for Multiemployer Pensions Act, or “Butch Lewis Act,” is estimated to cost $55 billion over 30 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. It is likely to face opposition in the GOP-led Senate.
Advocates of the bill argued the cost of inaction was too high and could leave too many people’s retirements in doubt. “When your house is on fire, you don’t speculate on how the fire got started or pontificate on how to prevent future fires. You put out the fire,” said Education and Labor Chairman Bobby Scott.
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