Pension Policy Should Level the Playing Field

Individuals who have earned retirement benefits can encounter obstacles in enforcing their rights to receive those benefits. Some obstacles can be overcome through assistance from a pension counseling project or government agency. But there are times that pension assistance is not enough, and people have to go to court. There they can encounter a very uneven playing field where the rules are often tilted in favor of plans and against plan participants. These rules can present insurmountable barriers to enforcing pension rights. These barriers include:

  • Barriers to getting into court
  • Barriers to winning in court
  • Barriers to recovering losses

People also come up against obstacles when they try to get the information they need in order to figure out whether they have a legal right that might be enforceable in court. These range from difficulties in getting plan documents to inability to finding a plan which has merged, moved or shut down.