New bill would rub out federal retirement benefits

There’s a new target on Capital Hill: The defined-benefit portion of the Federal Employees Retirement System.
Two senators have introduced a bill that would end the defined-benefit pension program for new federal employees — including members of Congress — starting in 2013.
The bill is called the Public-Private Employee Retirement Parity Act, and it was introduced by Richard Burr (R-NC) and Tom Coburn (R-OK).
It would not affect benefits for current federal employees.
Employees hired after 2013 would still be able to participate in the Federal Employees Retirement System 401(k)-type Thrift Savings Plan.
Participants in the Thrift Savings Plan receive matching contributions from their employing agencies on as much as five percent of their pay that’s contributed. Employees receive a dollar-for-dollar match on the first three percent of pay contributed, and a 50 percent match for the next two percent. Contributions above five percent receive no match.
Burr and Coburn’s reasoning for introducing the bill: The federal retirement system is already woefully underfunded, and to continue to fund it would put an unfair burden on taxpayers.
“We cannot ask taxpayers to continue to foot the bill for public employee benefits that are far more generous than their own,” Burr said in a statement on his website.
How much support the bill will receive in Congress remains to be seen. But it does have one thing going for it: The bill doesn’t put current members of Congress in a position where they’ll have to decide whether to keep or cut their own benefits.
We’ll keep you posted.
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