PBGC Hails Saved Pensions at Reorganized Smurfit-Stone Container Corp.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 30, 2010
WASHINGTON- Vince Snowbarger, acting director of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, issued the following statement today:
"The PBGC works actively with companies in bankruptcy to preserve worker pensions. So we are pleased to report success as Smurfit-Stone today emerges from Chapter 11 with its pension plans ongoing. Termination of the pension plans would have meant benefit cuts for the 61,000 workers and retirees covered by the plans, and $1.5 billion in liabilities added to the PBGC's deficit. We salute Smurfit-Stone and its lenders for completing a reorganization that does not burden retirees or the pension insurance program."
The PBGC is a federal corporation created under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974. It currently guarantees payment of basic pension benefits earned by 44 million American workers and retirees participating in over 29,000 private-sector defined benefit pension plans. The agency receives no funds from general tax revenues. Operations are financed largely by insurance premiums paid by companies that sponsor pension plans and by investment returns.
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PBGC No. 10-42
