James M. Jeffords: “Today, I am pleased to see that the Senate is taking action on the Pension Equity Act of 2003. As many of my colleagues…”

“Today, I am pleased to see that the Senate is taking action on the Pension Equity Act of 2003. As many of my colleagues are aware, the pension discount rate relief initiative, enacted in 2001, expired last month. Passage of H.R. 3108 will provide a resolution to this very serious issue. This bill replaces the outdated 30-year Treasury bill rate with a rate based on a composite of investment grade long-term corporate bonds. Failure to act on this bill will cause the statutory rate that pension plans must use to calculate their assets and liabilities to return to the old 30-year rate. Companies with pension plans will shortly have to begin making large contributions to their plans in the year to come. An amendment to H.R. 3108 will provide relief from the deficit reduction contribution, DRC, requirements that certain plans are now facing. Under the current pension funding rules, companies that offer defined benefit pension plans are required to make additional contributions to those plans when they are less than 90 percent funded.”