National Press Club Newsmaker: Josh Gotbaum Discusses Retirement Crisis for Baby Boomers

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Mar 27, 2012, 12:03 ET

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. chief Gotbaum to discuss retirement crisis for baby boomers, need for better pensions

WASHINGTON, March 27, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Some 10,000 people will retire every day for nearly the next two decades. Most are not ready, and they know it. Josh Gotbaum, director of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC), will discuss the looming retirement crisis facing baby boomers who will outlive their savings in the absence of traditional pensions to sustain them.

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The event begins at 10 a.m. Wednesday, April 4, in the club's Zenger Room. Reporters may participate by teleconference by dialing 800 407-3269.

Gotbaum will discuss PBGC's work to preserve America's pensions, with American Airlines' pensions a case in point. Since the airline filed for bankruptcy in November, PBGC pressured American Airlines to keep its pension commitments. Had American killed its pensions, the effect would have been felt beyond the airline's 130,000 workers and retirees. It would have reinforced the notion that people are on their own in retirement, an option usually produces poor results.

Gotbaum will lay out the case for retirement security and the need for flexibility to design 21st-century pension options to allow better fits for modern employers and the modern workforce. Defined benefit pensions not only offer a steady income for some 75 million families, but also provide an economic boost to the communities where retirees live.

PBGC protects the retirement incomes of more than 44 million American workers in more than 27,500 private-sector defined benefit pension plans.

SOURCE National Press Club