The AFL-CIO is a voluntary federation of 68 national and international labor unions, representing 13 million working women and men of every race and ethnicity and from every walk of life. The mission of the AFL-CIO is to improve the lives of working families to bring economic justice to the workplace and social justice to our Nation. Pension benefit security is a critical issue for union members. Millions of union workers now count on negotiated pension benefits when they reach retirement. Today, more than 17,000 retirement plans are collectively bargained, and unions represent roughly 3 in 10 retirement plan participants including close to half of all private sector defined benefit plan participants.
Pensions are a crucial piece of our national income system.
While Social Security provides a core floor of protections for working families, it is not designed to provide an adequate retirement income by it self. This section would permit debtors to waive the bankruptcy exemption that protects their pension benefits from creditors. A waiver could be obtained by contract with creditors prior to the initiation of a bankruptcy proceeding. For example, the waiver could be included as a term or condition in a credit card application or installment loan agreement at the insistence of a lender. If the individual accepts the waiver language, his or her pension benefits would be included in the bankruptcy estate, payable to creditors, as understand the waiver language.