Newfoundland and Labrador’s Liberal party has promised a one-time increase of 2.5% to public sector pensions, reports CBC News. The province’s Liberal leader Kevin Aylward announced the pledge at a rally held by the Public Sector Pensioners Association earlier this week. Beyond the one-time increase, he proposed annual increases of up to 2%, equivalent to […]
The gap between government employees and the rest of the working world is widening, says the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF). In response, the CTF has launched a campaign advocating for changes to public sector pensions and salaries. Quoting data from Statistics Canada, the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, the Fraser Institute, and the Canadian Federation […]
American corporate pension plans are underfunded by approximately $388 billion, according to a recent study by Credit Suisse. “The recent market turmoil has been unkind to many portfolios,” says the report, The Magic of Pension Accounting, Part V. “But it has been especially painful for defined benefit pension plans as they get hit with the […]
Increases in life expectancy have been consistently underestimated over the past few decades, creating funding difficulties for pension plan sponsors, according to a recent report by Swiss Re. The reinsurer suggests that plan sponsors should adopt forward-looking models instead of relying on traditional methods that don’t take emerging trends into account. “The failure to consider […]
Last December, I wrote an op/ed article in the Financial Post asking CPP expansionists to “Dial down the rhetoric on pensions” (FP Comment, Dec. 22, 2010). In this article, I call upon the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) to do the same. The CFIB has recently launched an aggressive attack on public sector pensions. […]
With global markets in turmoil and renewed fears of a global economic recession, one might expect that Canadian companies would be tightening their purse strings. This does not appear to be the case when it comes to salary budgets for 2012, according to a Morneau Shepell survey. On average, respondents said they were planning salary […]
Recent market volatility has dealt a severe blow to U.S. pension plans sponsored by S&P 1500 companies, this according to the latest figures by Mercer. Aggregate funded status decreased by US$191 billion to a funding deficit of US$496 billion and an aggregate funded ratio of 73% as of the market close on August 8. The […]
Prime Minister Stephen Harper has signed a social security agreement with Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff coordinating pension programs for Canadians and Brazilians who have lived or worked in the other country. The agreement was made during Harper’s Latin America tour. Specifically, the agreement will: reduce restrictions that may prevent Canadians from receiving pension benefits from […]
Improved market conditions and regulatory changes are improving the funding positions of Canada’s pension plans, but challenges in funding will remain into the foreseeable future, according to the DBRS 2011 Pension Study. The study is based on the results for 479 DB plans, over the span of 2002 to 2010. Superficially, pensions appear to be […]
The underfunded Nortel employee pension plans will benefit from the $7.2 billion sale of the company’s assets, but the creditor line is long and even this large sum of cash isn’t expected to put the fund back in the black. “It’s certainly unrealistic that it’s going to fill up the hole completely,” said lawyer Susan […]