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Government Affairs
The Senate Appropriations Committee on June 25 in a 16-14 vote approved the fiscal year 2016 Labor, Health and Human Services (LHHS) funding bill, which denies funding that would enable the Department of Labor (DOL) to implement the fiduciary rule.Committee Chairman Thad Chochran (R-Miss.) hailed...
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Appropriations subcommittees on Capitol Hill — in the House and now in the Senate — have taken a shot at blocking the Labor Department’s fiduciary proposal by denying funding for the measure.House BillOn June 24, the House of Representatives’ Appropriations Committee approved a fiscal year 2016...
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The public comments the Department of Labor is receiving on its proposed fiduciary rule already are having an effect, Labor Secretary Thomas Perez said at June 23 Brookings Institution forum in Washington, D.C.Perez said that among the comments they have received are expressions of concern...
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The IRS in Revenue Procedure 2015-34 has provided procedures by which multiemployer defined benefit plans that are in critical and declining status may apply for approval to suspend benefits. The IRS issued the revenue procedure on June 19, which is also the date on which the IRS began accepted the...
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The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) on June 19 issued an interim regulation to implement the partition provisions of the Kline-Miller Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014. The regulation makes it possible for financially troubled multiemployer pension plans to apply for PBGC...
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A House bill would stop the Department of Labor’s fiduciary proposal by cutting off funding to implement the measure.The measure was included by the House Appropriations Committee in the draft fiscal year 2016 Labor, Health and Human Services funding bill, and the Labor, Health and Human Services,...
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The June 17 Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee hearing provided ample illustration that the debate on the Department of Labor’s (DOL) fiduciary proposal is far from over. DOL Secretary Thomas E. Perez appeared before the subcommittee of the House Education and the Workforce...
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The Department of Labor’s Employee Benefit Security Administration has announced that it will hold public hearings on the fiduciary proposal on Aug. 10, 11 and 12 — and 13, if necessary. It also has extended the period for submitting comments on the proposed rule and exceptions to July 21.The...
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A new report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) confirms that in the years to come the U.S Treasury will receive “significant” tax revenues from retirement plan withdrawals.In fact, the CBO’s extended baseline projects that revenues as a share of GDP are projected to climb by about 0.3...
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ASPPA’s Government Affairs Committee (GAC) on June 8 filed comments with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to express concern about the IRS estimates of the cost burdens reported to OMB associated with new questions on the 2015 Form 5500 series, including the new Form 5500-SUP. ASPPA GAC...
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Bipartisan legislation introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives June 4 would allow pension plan participants to be automatically opted in to electronic delivery of documents. And a recent study suggests that the sponsors of the bill have good timing. Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.) introduced...
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The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) paid $5.4 billion in benefits to 842,000 retirees nationwide in 2014, it has reported. It also has broken down that data by state, but it would be a mistake to assume that just because a state has a high population, it will therefore have one of the...
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For those keeping score at home, a total of 36 individuals and organizations submitted comments on the Department of Labor’s April 14 fiduciary proposal during the first month of the comment period.The DOL’s Employee Benefits Security Administration has created a “public comments” page on its...
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Will the third time be the charm? House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-Minn.) and Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee Chairman Phil Roe (R-Tenn.) in a June 2 letter to Labor Secretary Thomas Perez have again repeated a request for additional information...
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The Bipartisan Policy Center convened what at least one participant termed a “policy wonk throwdown” in the nation’s capital May 27. The subject? The Department of Labor’s fiduciary proposal.The actual title of the event was “Champions, Critics and Consequences of a New Fiduciary Standard,” and it...
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The recent Department of Labor (DOL) study finding deficiencies in audits of employee benefit plans does not translate to a statement about how viable those plans are, says the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA). In a May 28 statement, AICPA said that “none of the quality issues identified by the...
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Physician, heal thyself. A study the Department of Labor (DOL) did of its audits of employee benefits plans shows that the department needs to improve the quality of those audits.In fact, such audits today are more likely to be deficient than they were a decade ago. Bloomberg BNA reports that the...
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Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) on May 21 released an update on the committee’s bipartisan tax working groups.The senators said they would allow the working groups more time to analyze current tax law and examine policy trade-offs and...
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On May 20, President Obama announced his intent to nominate a number of individuals to key Administration posts, including the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC).Assuming the Senate concurs, W. Thomas Reeder, Jr. is the President’s choice to head the nation’s private pension insurer. The...
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Employers, plan administrators, third party administrators and others associated with multiemployer plans have received reassurance regarding the scope of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation’s proposed rule on mandatory e-filing for certain multiemployer notices.The PBGC issued a clarification...
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