Correspondence: Charlie Price to Alexander; DOE/
Erbschloe to Price
Phone: 865-376-9636
Email: pceprice@aol.com
Senator Bill Frist
Dear Senator Frist:
We are asking for your help in increasing our retirement benefits and decreasing our cost of living. It is becoming more and more difficult for us to support ourselves. The cost of necessities and taxes keep rising and we need to hire help as we get unable to do home maintenance ourselves. Both of us have health problems that require some expenses not covered by insurance. But our income has not increased except for small adjustments in Social Security.
We are probably more fortunate than many of our age. We both have college educations. Both of us
worked until we reached retirement age and earned reasonable salaries. Elma taught school and has a
We ask that, as our representative, you carefully consider government spending and the tax burdens placed upon us. Please do whatever you can to keep the cost of necessities down. Just yesterday, we had to buy a new car battery and were astounded at the cost.
Should we not expect some increase in our pensions? We understand that DOE will not approve an
increase in Charles’ and other
We appreciate your dedicated service to us and our country. Please consider our concerns.
Sincerely,
Elma R. Price and Charles E. Price
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========Below is the letter sent to Charlie Price and
wife from DOE
Department of Energy
Office of Science
Office of the Director
Mr. and Mrs. Charles Price
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Price,
This is in response to your
The private sector companies that
manage the Department of Energy (DOC) facilities in
These companies report that they have a
surplus in pension assets; however, the amount in the pension fund can
fluctuate up or down based on the performance of invested pension assets.
Additionally, the surplus has already been reduced by recent plan enhancements
and changes in the Internal Revenue Service mortality tables that are used to
determine pension liabilities. These companies have a fiduciary responsibility
to protect pension benefits for both current employees and retirees.
In 2004,
UT-Battelle commissioned a Benefits Valuation Study that, according to the
UT-Battelle Chief Financial Officer, shows the defined benefit plan to be
approximately 14 percent higher than the comparators' plans. These comparators
include several universities, Argonne National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest
National Laboratory, Battelle Memorial Institute, and private industry giants
such as General Electric, Motorola, Merck, Honeywell, and Dow Chemical.
The
UT -Battelle Benefits Manager has confirmed that retirees are receiving, at a
minimum, the promised dollar value of their pension plans. According to UT -
Battelle, it has met or exceeded all legal requirements for pension payments to
retirees.
Mr. and Mrs.
Charles Price
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at (202) 586-5440, or Gerald Boyd, Manager, Oak Ridge Office, at (865) 576-4444.
Sincerely,
(original signed)
Donald R. Erbschloe
Acting Chief Operating Officer Office
of Science
cc:
Senator Lamar Alexander
Attn: Elizabeth Howell
Jill Sigal, CI-lIFORS
Eric Nicoll, CI-20/FORS
George J. Malosh, M-2, SC-OR
Robert J. Brown, M-3, SC-OR
Daniel H. Wilken, AD-40, SC-OR
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Subject: Correspondence: Charlie Price to Alexander;
DOE/ Erbschloe to Price
Blog Title: What constitutes
Equitable?
Author: Al Brooks E-Mail: brooks50@comcast.net
Comment: I guess the word
'equitable' has been redefined in the last twenty years. Assuming that my
western counterparts and I had equitable salaries at my retirement twenty years
ago, my multiplier factor of 1.2 compared to 2.5 gave me an initial handicap of
108 %; followed by an inflation loss of 55 %over a twenty year period
compensated by adjustments of 26.7 %. This is a current handicap of about 65 %.
That may be called equitable in DC but in TN it's called a rip-off.
Seriously, 'equitable' is a
subjective word meaning different things to different people. Even the
statement "In 2004, UT-Battelle commissioned a Benefits Valuation Study
that, according to the UT-Battelle Chief Financial Officer, shows the defined
benefit plan to be approximately 14 percent higher than the comparators'
plans." is of little use unless the basis for the comparison is disclosed.
'Equitable' includes approximate equality in the following: a) Compensation for
equivalent, actual job content with consideration of local costs-of-living, b)
Use of similar pension models and equivalent plan parameters including service
allowed, multipliers and inflation adjustments, and c) A comparison of actual
pension results. In the reply from DOE/Erbschole there is a glaring absence of
the south-west DOE installations which have for years been considered a peer
group for
See http://home.comcast.net/~brooks50/PensionInflation.htm
for more details of the model and backup data.
This DOE claim of a 14% above
average pension plans has prompted a new analysis
of the overall Oak Ridge pension plan equity against an average of DOE
installations.
Late Breaking Information
Just received, a copy of a recent letter DOE to CORRE re Pension
Equity – DOE compares recent plan benefits PLUS Social Security payments to the
terminal wages to reach the conclusion that the
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