Pensions

When you accept a job offer, you might be joining a startup or a speculative business. That's what I usually do. I think that in order to do something significant, I have to accept some risk.

But ten years ago, when you or someone you know joined a company as a worker, if you were offered stock options as a benefit you accepted a risky proposition. By contrast, if you accepted a retirement package or a defined-benefits pension, you got a contract, legally executable in the United States as specified in the Constitution.

I believe companies offering these pensions owe those pensions. Stockholders on the board are there for the risky possibility of a boon. Salaried employees made a square deal. Defaulting on that deal without taking some of the damage is unforgivable.

I want a law. I want the SEC to require quarterly pension fund reports from every company offering a pension. And for each quarter in which managers or board members are compensated, or for every instance where profits are distributed aside from dividends to common stockholders, they must meet their pension obligations. Any underfunding of a pension fund will be met with cash from the pockets of the management, or else their shares of the company will be sold to make up for the shortfall.

Executives have been above justice too long.