On behalf of our members, Health & PensionWORKS tracks issues affecting multiemployer health and pension plans to ensure trustees and administrators are prepared for the potential impacts of federal legislation and administrative regulations. Our coalition engages early and often throughout the policy making process to educate policy makers and make certain that our members’ concerns are heard, understood, and accounted for when both policy problems and opportunities arise. Among other issues, the coalition is especially focused on reforms included in the SECURE 2.0 Act, particularly the law’s catch-up contribution and 401(k) automatic enrollment provisions; the looming threat posed by the catastrophic impact of high-cost specialty drugs on multiemployer health plans’ financial solvency; challenges associated with the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA); pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) reform; PBGC solvency; and the Special Financial Assistance (SFA) program administration.
Success Story
Moving the Needle in Washington: A Health&PensionWORKS Success Story
Throughout the drafting, passage, and implementation of The SECURE 2.0 Act, Health&PensionWORKS engaged and educated federal policy makers on its potential impact on TaftHartley plans. The Coalition supported the goals of the Act but focused in particular on the unintended consequences of the law’s 401(k) automatic enrollment mandate.
Here, the coalition played a pivotal role in helping to lessen the damage of the blunt instrument of government, shaping a key regulation concerning whether new employers adopting a preexisting multiemployer plan would be subject to the law’s new automatic enrollment provisions. These provisions are significantly more difficult, if not impossible, to administer for multiemployer plans compared to single and multiple employer plans. In discussions with policymakers, the coalition both highlighted the real-world unworkable implications of automatic enrollment for multiemployer plans and articulated the legal rationale within the text of the law to issue guidance clarifying the law’s 401(k) automatic enrollment provisions did not apply to new employers adopting a preexisting multiemployer plan.
Ultimately, through sustained education and engagement with federal policymakers, including high-level discussions with senior Department of Treasury and Department of Labor officials, the coalition’s efforts helped to secure an administrative rule clarifying that new employers who join a preexisting multiemployer plan will not be subject to the law’s unworkable automatic enrollment mandate.
What’s Next?
This outcome was the direct result of Health&PensionWORKS taking its seat at the policymaking table. However, more still needs to be done. Multiemployer plans that were created after the passage of SECURE 2.0, or are adopting a new 401(k) element, will still be subject to the automatic enrollment provision. This means that around two thirds of the multiemployer plans around the country are still lacking a solution.
The Multiemployer Plan Relief Act (MPRA) offers a smart fix by exempting these plans from the automatic enrollment mandate. MPRA will preserve efficient plan operations and ensure working people continue to build secure retirements. Health&PensionWORKS continues to engage and educate on this issue as MPRA makes its way through Congress. To find out more about these bills, please see the links here for both the House and Senate versions.
Our Advocacy Focus areas:
Healthcare
- High-Cost Specialty Drug Pricing
- Mental Health Parity & Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) – NQTL Comparative Analysis Reform
- Opposing new fees on Taft-Hartley self-funded plans (i.e. reinsurance fees or claims assessments)
- Promoting price transparency and affordability for prescription drugs
Pensions
- SECURE 2.0 401(k) Automatic Enrollment and the Multiemployer Plan Automatic Enrollment Relief Act (MPAERA)
- SECURE 2.0 ROTH Catch-Up Contributions
- PBGC Solvency & Reforms
- Multiemployer Pension Reform
Tax Issues
Don’t Tax Our Healthcare
Health&PensionWORKS was originally created in part to advocate against the Cadillac Tax. This was a proposed 40% excise tax on premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance plans above a certain dollar amount included in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010. This would have been used to pay for other provisions within the ACA, but at the same time would have made healthcare more expensive or unaffordable for the 178 million Americans relying on employment-based healthcare. The Health&PensionWORKS Coalition, along with many other organizations that recognized the same issue, worked to successfully repeal the Cadillac Tax in 2019.
However, despite how unpopular the Cadillac Tax was, proposals to tax employer-sponsored healthcare are still regularly being brought forward and discussed in the halls of Congress. We remain committed to educating our lawmakers and policymakers about the negative effects of a tax on healthcare, at the participant, employer, plan, provider, or any other level. Especially for multiemployer plans, a tax on health care at any point in the process leads to increased costs to plan participants, as all funds used to pay for this healthcare are taken out through the collective bargaining process. This makes it difficult for the 20 million Americans covered under multiemployer plans to afford this essential healthcare.
Market Volatility
Zone Certifications and the Pension Protection Act
Health&PensionWORKS continues to educate key decision makers on the negative effects of massive, unexpected downturns in the market. Under the Pension Protection Act of 2006, defined benefit pension plans must meet various minimum standards to be placed into different zone certification categories. Falling into a certain zone can indicate a plan’s declining financial health and comes with certain requirements. These requirements, including reporting, adoption of a rehabilitation plan, and notices to plan beneficiaries, can have cascading negative effects, harming a plan’s ability to return to a higher zone certification. During a market downturn, even plans that are well-managed may soon find themselves falling into a worse zone. In the past, during certain economic crises – such as the Great Recession in 2008, and the COVID crisis in 2020 – both Republicans and Democrats have supported pauses to the zone certification process, to allow time for plans to recover from any short-term dips in the market. Health&PensionWORKS has continued to raise this as a possibility should any significant market volatility occur.
Interested in Becoming a Member?
By combining the weight of your membership with dozens of allied Taft-Hartley plans and stakeholders from across the country, you will be part of a broad-based coalition that has been extraordinarily effective at educating federal policymakers on the importance of multiemployer plans and the positive impact they have on so many Americans.