Amazing thread!
I have to add another example of pension plans not being secured -- Crown Corporations...
These formerly Government-run organizations originally did not need to put the pension plans into trust when they privatized. (Pensions continued to be financed from current revenues, like the governments that BPA links to).
But, a crown corporation can go bankrupt, and pretty easily.
This is what (almost) happened at Air Canada in 2003 when they filed for bankruptcy.
Canada's national airline originated from the Canadian federal government's 1936 creation of Trans-Canada Airlines (TCA), and was privatized in 1988
My relative, in 2003, who had been retired for all of 2 years, receiving a company pension, received a warning letter that his pension monthly amount would drop to only 30% its current value. as a result of the bankruptcy filing. Thank goodness that never realized when they emerged from restructuring, but it could have. It really could have. And the company would have done it just to improve finances if allowed.
He worked for the airline for 37 years, since the 1960's, and even with the privatization, always assumed it would continue to be backed by the government at the end if needed (because 75% of his working years was actually for the government before privatization!). Yes, his pension was a generous one, but a sudden massive loss of your income, forever, is crushing news. I would not be surprised to see more government pension announcements like the Detroit one BPA posted, or for "top hat" pension benefits cut.
The key is to check if the pension money is fully funded and put into a "trust" account, rather than general revenue. Today, more pensions (government too) are putting new pension $'s into trust, but some still have not funded the decades of prior commitments.
