Central Laborers' Pension Fund v. Thomas E. Heinz et al. (541 U.S. 739)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 7, 2004 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 541 U.S. 739 · 124 S. Ct. 2230
- Decided
- June 7, 2004
- Term
- October Term 2003
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Souter
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Souter delivered the opinion of the Court. With few exceptions, the “anti-cutback” rule of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) prohibits any amendment of a pension plan that would reduce a participant’s “accrued benefit.” 88 Stat. 858, 29 U. S. C. § 1054(g). The question is whether the rule prohibits an amendment expanding the categories of postretirement employment that trigger suspension of payment of early retirement benefits already accrued. We hold such an amendment prohibited. I Respondents Thomas Heinz and Richard Schmitt (collectively, Heinz) are retired participants in a multiemployer pension plan (hereinafter Plan) administered by petitioner Central Laborers’ Pension Fund. Like most other participants in the Plan, Heinz worked in the construction industry in central Illinois before retiring, and by 1996, he had accrued enough pension credits to qualify for early retirement payments under a defined benefit “service only” pension. This scheme pays him the same monthly retirement benefit he would have received if he had retired at the usual age, and is thus a form of subsidized benefit, since monthly payments are not discounted even though they start earlier and are likely to continue longer than the average period. Heinz’s entitlement is subject to a condition on which this case focuses: the Plan prohibits beneficiaries of service only…
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