Court Tells GM Executives Tough Luck On Pension Cuts

A federal appeals court on Wednesday rejected a lawsuit by more than 100 retired General Motors executives over cuts to their retirement benefits.

As a condition of the U.S. Treasury’s $49.5 billion GM bailout in 2009, the bankrupt automaker was required to cut, by two-thirds, executive pensions that exceeded $100,000 a year.

The retired executives who sued include a number of former GM vice presidents, including John G. Middlebrook, who was vice president and general manager of vehicle brand marketing. He also was a general manager of the Chevrolet Division and helped launch GM’s now-shuttered Saturn division.

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TheSteve - 8/7/2013 4:01:45 PM

+1 Boost

I'm just rolling my eyes. Seriously, folks.

valhallakey - 8/7/2013 6:02:35 PM

+2 Boost

Seems to me all pension monies should be set aside separate from the companies other finances. Many people made decisions to stay with a company or move to another company based on pension benefits only to have those disappear and normally it did not require a bankruptcy to do perform this magic trick. If you break a contract with someone you can be sued etc... but companies do this all the time with little or no consequences. If companies are people as some people say then they should be held accountable just as a person would. Not that I am endorsing 20M/y pensions either... that is insane.

tundrahq - 8/8/2013 9:20:02 AM

+4 Boost

This is f'ing unbelievable. The "business leaders" who helped GM roll down the path to bankruptcy and ruin had the audacity to complain when their generous pension benefits were curtailed.

The stones on these guys...it's incredible GM survived as long as they did.

Sciros - 8/8/2013 10:24:15 AM

+2 Boost

Well if your pension goes from $100,000 to $34,000 that does kind of suck a lot doesn't it? I mean one is enough to live comfortably, and the other isn't even enough to get by in some places. I think the sweeping "2/3 of anything over 100k" is excessive and should have been a graded cut so that people aren't eating fast food just to get by as that's not going to be helping anyone either. Cutting a $3 million pension by 2/3 is one thing... and is that enough of a "punishment" (if you're into that sort of thing) I don't know... but cutting a $100k pension by 2/3 is something different. So while the article brings up a $20 million pension, I don't really see how people can generalize from that obvious outlier.

Also don't act like everyone is equally culpable.

And the comments on that article about how every public employee should lose their pensions... WTF. Public sector doesn't have nearly the wages that the private sector does (I have clients in both so I see this and I understand how the promise of decent benefits down the road is the only thing keeping some people in the jobs, otherwise there would be NOBODY to fill them except the truly incompetent, and believe me you've seen nothing yet if you think it's already as bad as it can get). SMH, if you want to even things out, as a greedy-ass "taxpayer" you'd just be paying for more equal wages than for pensions. Some people I just don't understand. I'm happy to be able to live comfortably and pay it forward, that's what keeps the lights on and the gears turning because I don't want to build my own water treatment systems and power generators and live off the grid somewhere in the woods.

mrcassis - 8/8/2013 2:02:22 PM

-1 Boost

I was about to say! It seems like years since us conservative nuts and regressives got together....held hands...and completed our ritual. LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLets get ready to bash Obamaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!