Tim Walberg: “We are certainly willing to work with the States and would concur that there ought to be a laboratory. But again, our…”

“We are certainly willing to work with the States and would concur that there ought to be a laboratory. But again, our concern, and basically the only concern, that this resolution deals with is that they be managed in such a way that they come under the protections given under ERISA. And why do we say that? Well, we look at, for instance, Illinois' unfunded liability. We are looking at $114.8 billion at the end of fiscal year 2016--a State plan managed by, yes, an outside manager--but $114.8 billion under. We look at California Public Employees' Retirement System, CalPERS, which has a $228.2 billion shortfall in funding. Oregon's unfunded actuarial liability of the Oregon Public Employees Retirement Fund, again, managed by someone for Oregon, of $21.8 billion. If we looked at it all put together, we have over $5 trillion unfunded liability for State plans managed by some outside source. That is where our concern comes from--this rule that was put through--that takes people out of the protections of ERISA. So we are saying: Have at it, States, but do it according to the rules and the protections that are there. That is all we are asking. We want retirees' savings to be protected for the purposes that they planned for and not come up short some day because of a lack of care and the coverage of ERISA on their plans. I reserve the balance of my time.”