Pierce writes: "Defined-benefits pensions 'don't really exist' anymore because of deliberate acts of politicians that encouraged their wholescale destruction by American business."

Roger Goodell 'wants to freeze referee retirement plans that have been in place for years.' (photo: Peter Kramer/NBC/Getty Images)

Roger Goodell and the 1 Percent's War On Pensions

By Charles Pierce, Esquire Magazine

17 September 12

hat Roger Goodell, lord high commissioner of the National Football League, is a well-kept tool of the various plutocrats who own the franchises in the league over which he ostensibly presides is well beyond dispute at this point. But, as he currently helps the league commit consumer fraud on a weekly basis by entrusting the game to scab referees, he also is giving the game away on how exactly the people who pay his salary feel about people who work on salary generally in this country. Here's the head of the NFL Referees Association, even before this latest weekend of high-rent grifting:

"The key is the pension issue," [Scott] Green told HuffPost, adding that the pensions have been around since the mid-1970s. "A lot of our guys have made life-career decisions based on assuming that pension would be there."

In facing a pension freeze, the NFL refs have plenty of company. Corporations across the country have been trying to switch their employees from traditional defined benefit pension plans to cheaper, less reliable defined contribution plans. Just one example is Con-Ed, which recently locked out workers as it tried to phase out employees' traditional pensions and move them to 401(k)s.

And then, from the man himself:

"From the owners' standpoint, right now they're funding a pension program that is a defined benefit program," said Goodell, who was in Washington on Wednesday attending a luncheon hosted by Politico's Playbook. "About ten percent of the country has that. Yours truly doesn't have that. It's something that doesn't really exist anymore and that I think is going away steadily."

(Gotta love that "Yours Truly" touch. Rog is suggesting to the Politico buffet-grazers that he's really one of them. He'd sell them all for car-fare if it put another million in Jerry Jones's pocket.)

That's the tell, right there. This is the technique that has worked - alas, too successfully - for the one percent in almost every industry in America. People don't really have pensions anymore because the financial-services industry helped the one percent loot them for the benefit of folks like Willard Romney, which they were able to do because they were encouraged to bust unions and force people into 401K's, which sank with the rest of the economy while they were stealing everything that wasn't nailed down. Now look, over there: That teacher/fireman/NFL referee has something you don't have! That person stole it from you. Go get 'em. We'll wait right here on our piles of money while you and him fight.

Defined-benefits pensions "don't really exist" anymore because of deliberate acts of politicians that encouraged their wholescale destruction by American business. We didn't "evolve" from them to 401K's. We got them stolen out from under us. Roger Goodell is just the latest front man.

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+31 # BradFromSalem 2012-09-17 12:33

Don't forget Willie Romney of Willie and Paul, The R&R Boys, who would buy up companies or rather borrow money to buy up companies, then use the Pension fund of the employee's to pay back the loan that Willie's company borrowed.
Pension funds have become an asset in today's 1% run world instead of an obligation made by a company to the people it employs.

+55 # dkonstruction 2012-09-17 12:37

Pensions have historically been defined by the labor movement as "deferred wages." In other words, workers earn their pensions today but agree to "defer" payment of this money until later (when they have retired). Therefore, they are not "benefits" in the same way as paid vacation and sick days or even health insurance. They are wages/salaries that workers earn today but don't collect until later.

If employers want to cut pensions then they should be forced to put this money back into the wages/pay that workers receive today otherwise employers are in fact implementing a pay cut.

+8 # Majikman 2012-09-18 08:46

In the pre St Ronald era I worked for a large airline that offered a great pension & benefits plan, great salary and (gasp) profit sharing. Remember how wonderful it was to fly back then when you were treated like a human being? Comfy seats, meals on board, courteous employees who knew their job, courtesy hotel & meal vouchers if your flight was cancelled etc. Then we were "Bained" and it all turned to shit...not just for the employees but also for passengers.
Guess what you football fans are in for.

+20 # dyannne 2012-09-17 20:01

Despicable. And sane people are actually going to vote for Mitt Romney and his ilk into the White House. Bleh and Vomit.

+11 # Cdesignpdx 2012-09-17 21:55

Those scab refs need to be careful around 280lb+ linemen.
Pensions are earned not given and I hope the players will rally around the striking "players." You may not agree with all their calls, but do agree with their ability to retire in dignity.

+7 # Independentgal 2012-09-18 05:24

The Federal government was in the forefront of switching to a defined contribution plan. It happened during Reagan's term. So, whenever the right wing starts whining about the great pension the government employees get, they can be reminded that Reagan started the ball rolling for a much smaller pension. The government's equivalent to a 401(k) is only as good as the stock market, and of course folks need to contribute to their 401(k)'s to the max. Those who don't, whether because of not enough left over after normal living expenses or too lazy to do so, will have real problems when they retire. That is, if they can ever afford to retire.

+6 # HarryP 2012-09-18 06:46

It is a process that goes back at least to the Reagan administration when he broke the air traffic controllers' union. Chunks of pensions have been sliced off ever since. But it's not enough for billionaires to take it out of the hide of the middle class, they're turning now on millionaires. The NFL wants to gut the pensions, the NHL wants its players, despite profits of $3.3 billion last year, to take a 24% salary cut. Half of the classes in universities are taught be capable people who, however, are essentially scabs without benefits of pensions or health care. So it goes.

+11 # graybeard.tom 2012-09-18 07:20

pierce references something that has bothered me for some time now when he notes,"now look, over there. that teacher/fireman /nfl referee has something you don't have. that person stole it from you. go get 'em."

30 years ago, folks took teacher/fireman /public sector jobs that did not pay as well as private sector jobs - but as partial compensation they had excellent benefit packages (what we union folks refer to as "conditions").
over the past 30 years "the market" has steadily eroded both the wages and conditions of private sector employment. now the public sector employees often are working for better wages and substantially better benefits than their private sector counterparts.
its not because the public sector has flourished - its because the private sector has been raped. so now the rapists can point out how much better the public sector has things, and use envy to create hate so that one group of workers will turn on another group of workers and demand that everyone suffer.

take a guess about who wins in this little drama; hint - it ain't anybody you know....

+1 # okie_mule 2012-09-18 11:19

Now I read in the local newspaper that the public employee pension CONTRACT can be "legally" changed to change benefit amounts. In California the governor signed a bill re: future retiree benefits only, but there are those who intend to go after and reduce current legally guaranteed retirement benefits of public employees. If we let them get away with that, the response will either be "baaaaah, baaaah, I wish we could do something" or it will be "on a cold day in hell!"

+1 # Doll 2012-09-18 14:55

And when you do go to cash in on those 401Ks, the broker gets a cut: One dollar for you, two for me, another dollar for you two more for me....

This happened to my late husband. He even had a few bucks left over but they wanted hundreds to process it.

Greed knows no bounds.

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