UAW managed health care

[HigherIQ]

I can't wait to hear the sales pitch on the SUPER VEBA. Found forementioned article on the Internet nice to see that not only do the senior leadership of the UAW receive nice pay packages and better pension and insurance package then the membership they can actually appoint themselves to the board of the VEBA and receive a extra $30000 per year in compensation. They seem to be out of touch with the membership. Wonder how much they will get to appoint themselves to be on the board of a SUPER VEBA?

[cecilmeyer]

I can't wait to hear the sales pitch on the SUPER VEBA. Found forementioned article on the Internet nice to see that not only do the senior leadership of the UAW receive nice pay packages and better pension and insurance package then the membership they can actually appoint themselves to the board of the VEBA and receive a extra $30000 per year in compensation. They seem to be out of touch with the membership. Wonder how much they will get to appoint themselves to be on the board of a SUPER VEBA?

 

Pardon me for a moment while I confuse all of you with some facts...

 

 

The UAW Benefits Failure That Wasn't

By Jeff Green, Bloomberg.com

August 27, 2015 5:33 PM

 

 

The experiment looked doomed at the start. Five years ago, General Motors, Ford Motor, and Chrysler, with the blessing of the United Automobile Workers union, created an independent entity to provide health insurance for more than 700,000 retirees and to manage the investments that would finance the benefits. The move was good for the automakers, allowing them to shed crushing liabilities that threatened to impede their recovery amid the Great Recession. The conventional wisdom was that the trust fund would quickly run low on money and ask union retirees to cough up large annual premiums or settle for more limited coverage. “People didn’t believe the math worked,” recalls Art Schwartz, GM’s labor negotiator at the time.

 

Contrary to expectations, the $61 billion UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust is thriving. Retirees’ drug costs are falling; dental, vision, and other benefits have even been added. What’s more, the investment fund that pays for all of it has booked double-digit annual returns in recent years. “A lot of people thought this wouldn’t hunt,” says Fran Parker, who came out of retirement in 2010 to run the trust. Parker, who previously headed a large health plan in Michigan, said in a July 10 interview that she relished the challenge. “I thought, Oh dear, I’m going to take care of the same people that I took care of when they were active. What a fitting bookend.”

 

Under Parker, the UAW trust, which is the largest private purchaser of medical care in the U.S., is forging paths in benefits management and emerging as a corporate-governance advocate. “The fund has accomplished some really impressive things,” says Harley Shaiken, a labor professor at the University of California at Berkeley, adding that there are lessons for other plans in how the trust’s managers have reduced costs by remixing coverage and pushing preventive services.

 

Skeptics had predicted health-care inflation would continue to run at 3 percent to 5 percent a year, outpacing returns on investments. Fortunately for the trust’s managers, that inflation rate has been relatively low, a little less than 3 percent last year.

 

Parker, a self-professed “big-data geek,” has beefed up coverage for preventive care and used analytics to pinpoint areas where costs could be better managed. In the past, routine doctors’ appointments weren’t covered, so retirees flooded urgent-care centers and emergency rooms when they fell ill. After administrators discovered that 400 retirees a month are newly diagnosed with diabetes, the plan began paying for programs that teach them how to contain the disease by changing habits. Coverage has also been added for cardiac rehabilitation for heart attack patients, for blood pressure screenings, and for programs to encourage people to buy lower-cost generic drugs. Annual pharmacy savings of about $500 million helped pay for dental and vision coverage.

 

The trust has $61 billion in assets under the direction of interim Chief Investment Officer Avtar Vasu, who used to be part of the team managing Harvard’s endowment. Investment performance has exceeded expectations, with gains of 14 percent in 2013, the most recent data available. That’s almost triple that year’s returns for pension funds at Ford and GM.

 

Meredith Miller, the trust’s corporate-governance chief, previously worked in the Connecticut treasurer’s office, where she helped thwart a plan by toolmaker Stanley Works (now Stanley Black & Decker) to quit the state and incorporate in Bermuda. In her current role, Miller leads a group of institutional investors that’s urging Wal-Mart Stores and others to be more forthcoming about when and how they force executives to return bonuses earned for actions later determined to be illegal or unethical. A trust proposal to make it easier for stock owners to appoint directors was endorsed by McDonald’s shareholders in May.

 

Miller also helms the Human Capital Management Coalition, a group of 24 funds with more than $2.3 trillion in combined assets that focuses on how companies develop policies on safety, diversity, and fair labor practices. Since 2010 the UAW trust has been on a letter-writing campaign to press companies in which it has stakes to add women to their boards, Miller says, because of growing evidence that diversity at the top improves the bottom line. Four of the 34 companies it’s reached out to so far, including CF Industries Holdings and Visteon, have added female directors.

 

Overall, the UAW’s experiment with the fund has been so successful that union President Dennis Williams is suggesting a similar arrangement for about 195,000 active autoworkers at GM, Ford, and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles as part of negotiations for a labor contract now under way.

 

One doubter who’s been happily proven wrong is Jim Kaster, who retired in 2007 from GM’s assembly plant in Lordstown, Ohio. “We were scared to death when they were going bankrupt. We thought it was really going to be tough for us and our families, because we’d seen what happened at other companies,” recalls the 68-year-old. “I’d say now we’re tickled to death about how it’s turned out. They’re doing a good job.”

 

The bottom line: The UAW’s $61 billion health trust for retirees has logged double-digit returns in recent years.

 

finance.yahoo.com/news/uaw-benefits-failure-wasnt-213310866.html?.tsrc=applewf

 

 

... And now you may carry on with your union bashing. Have a nice day.

Last Edit: about an hour ago by remember1976

I got this article from the site you linked.Looks like the vast majority of people on the site bash the the union.

 

Read more: http://scottrlap.proboards.com/thread/14946/#ixzz3kIziMKqV

[cal50]

All I know is at least if the the union was running our healthcare and they stole the funds someone is going to jail versus someone at the corporate level would not only not go to jail but get a raise!!I'll take my chances with the union over the company any day.Since day one at Ford the company has never stopped try to cheat me.The union from day one has almost every time defended me when I needed help.Just remember people can say what they want about the union but I know exactly where I stand with the company.Do not ever forget who they are.They would fire all of us and throw your family in the street to starve if they could get away with it.I have seen them try to cheat a worker dying of cancer his family's insurance money because he did not sign one piece of paper.The union had to fight but they did prevail and his family received their insurance money.We are nothing but chattel to Ford do not forget that.

 

 

Simply amazing.....

[cal50]

 

Pardon me for a moment while I confuse all of you with some facts...

 

 

The UAW Benefits Failure That Wasn't

By Jeff Green, Bloomberg.com

August 27, 2015 5:33 PM

 

 

The experiment looked doomed at the start. Five years ago, General Motors, Ford Motor, and Chrysler, with the blessing of the United Automobile Workers union, created an independent entity to provide health insurance for more than 700,000 retirees and to manage the investments that would finance the benefits. The move was good for the automakers, allowing them to shed crushing liabilities that threatened to impede their recovery amid the Great Recession. The conventional wisdom was that the trust fund would quickly run low on money and ask union retirees to cough up large annual premiums or settle for more limited coverage. “People didn’t believe the math worked,” recalls Art Schwartz, GM’s labor negotiator at the time.

 

Contrary to expectations, the $61 billion UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust is thriving. Retirees’ drug costs are falling; dental, vision, and other benefits have even been added. What’s more, the investment fund that pays for all of it has booked double-digit annual returns in recent years. “A lot of people thought this wouldn’t hunt,” says Fran Parker, who came out of retirement in 2010 to run the trust. Parker, who previously headed a large health plan in Michigan, said in a July 10 interview that she relished the challenge. “I thought, Oh dear, I’m going to take care of the same people that I took care of when they were active. What a fitting bookend.”

 

Under Parker, the UAW trust, which is the largest private purchaser of medical care in the U.S., is forging paths in benefits management and emerging as a corporate-governance advocate. “The fund has accomplished some really impressive things,” says Harley Shaiken, a labor professor at the University of California at Berkeley, adding that there are lessons for other plans in how the trust’s managers have reduced costs by remixing coverage and pushing preventive services.

 

Skeptics had predicted health-care inflation would continue to run at 3 percent to 5 percent a year, outpacing returns on investments. Fortunately for the trust’s managers, that inflation rate has been relatively low, a little less than 3 percent last year.

 

Parker, a self-professed “big-data geek,” has beefed up coverage for preventive care and used analytics to pinpoint areas where costs could be better managed. In the past, routine doctors’ appointments weren’t covered, so retirees flooded urgent-care centers and emergency rooms when they fell ill. After administrators discovered that 400 retirees a month are newly diagnosed with diabetes, the plan began paying for programs that teach them how to contain the disease by changing habits. Coverage has also been added for cardiac rehabilitation for heart attack patients, for blood pressure screenings, and for programs to encourage people to buy lower-cost generic drugs. Annual pharmacy savings of about $500 million helped pay for dental and vision coverage.

 

The trust has $61 billion in assets under the direction of interim Chief Investment Officer Avtar Vasu, who used to be part of the team managing Harvard’s endowment. Investment performance has exceeded expectations, with gains of 14 percent in 2013, the most recent data available. That’s almost triple that year’s returns for pension funds at Ford and GM.

 

Meredith Miller, the trust’s corporate-governance chief, previously worked in the Connecticut treasurer’s office, where she helped thwart a plan by toolmaker Stanley Works (now Stanley Black & Decker) to quit the state and incorporate in Bermuda. In her current role, Miller leads a group of institutional investors that’s urging Wal-Mart Stores and others to be more forthcoming about when and how they force executives to return bonuses earned for actions later determined to be illegal or unethical. A trust proposal to make it easier for stock owners to appoint directors was endorsed by McDonald’s shareholders in May.

 

Miller also helms the Human Capital Management Coalition, a group of 24 funds with more than $2.3 trillion in combined assets that focuses on how companies develop policies on safety, diversity, and fair labor practices. Since 2010 the UAW trust has been on a letter-writing campaign to press companies in which it has stakes to add women to their boards, Miller says, because of growing evidence that diversity at the top improves the bottom line. Four of the 34 companies it’s reached out to so far, including CF Industries Holdings and Visteon, have added female directors.

 

Overall, the UAW’s experiment with the fund has been so successful that union President Dennis Williams is suggesting a similar arrangement for about 195,000 active autoworkers at GM, Ford, and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles as part of negotiations for a labor contract now under way.

 

One doubter who’s been happily proven wrong is Jim Kaster, who retired in 2007 from GM’s assembly plant in Lordstown, Ohio. “We were scared to death when they were going bankrupt. We thought it was really going to be tough for us and our families, because we’d seen what happened at other companies,” recalls the 68-year-old. “I’d say now we’re tickled to death about how it’s turned out. They’re doing a good job.”

 

The bottom line: The UAW’s $61 billion health trust for retirees has logged double-digit returns in recent years.

 

finance.yahoo.com/news/uaw-benefits-failure-wasnt-213310866.html?.tsrc=applewf

 

 

... And now you may carry on with your union bashing. Have a nice day.

Last Edit: about an hour ago by remember1976

I got this article from the site you linked.Looks like the vast majority of people on the site bash the the union.

 

Read more: http://scottrlap.proboards.com/thread/14946/#ixzz3kIziMKqV

 

 

 

 

The success of VEBA largely depends on the stock market and successful investing by the VEBA managers.

Currently if the benefit is provided by Ford its linked to the sale of an actual product and backed by other company assets ( stocks, bonds, cash, etc.)

 

Which do you really think is more solid and managed by professionals ?

 

 

The UAW should stick to negotiating company provided benefits and not getting into the business of providing them.

[Decker]

Cecil,

I may be a little confused with all your facts, so please bare with me....do you think that this may be a selling point, marketing strategy or just coincidental that Bloomberg releases an artical on the achievements of a fund that released three major corporations from a very large concern of their share holders?

 

On 27 Aug. 2015?

Opinions on the management of an organization wether for or against can at times be portrayed as "bashing". Especially when an organization has become one with repeated expressions on and for the cause of taking on even more of the companies contractual obligations. Maybe you could come up with a better description or label of the members that post here, for no other reason then if you truly take in consideration of how the last 15 to 20 years this organization has been managed.

 

Cecil, I`m sure you know the answer but, I have to ask. Did Walter fight for a company funded pension and health care benefits? Would it be a basher if one would side with Walter`s points of veiw on this subject?

Bloomberg is a favorite of this old long hair because this resource tends to look for the facts and issues that best benefit the share holders, corporations and all those up in coming insurance businesses.

With the article and the trends in my organization of being one of the emerging insurgence corporations, I will relate once again that the unionism that our organization was founded on was not one of taking on the cooperation as a business partner but one of representing the organizations main reason for existing, the membership.

As a share holder I want to thank you Cecil for the article. I hadn't seen it.

Decker a very frustrated member.

Edited August 30, 2015 by Decker

[Tier2]

 

 

 

 

The success of VEBA largely depends on the stock market and successful investing by the VEBA managers.

Currently if the benefit is provided by Ford its linked to the sale of an actual product and backed by other company assets ( stocks, bonds, cash, etc.)

 

Which do you really think is more solid and managed by professionals ?

 

The UAW should stick to negotiating company provided benefits and not getting into the business of providing them.

You complain VEBA success is dependant on the stock market, then say currently the benefit is provided by Ford so its safer. You do understand Ford's success is dependant on the stock market correct? It's not a coincidence that Ford was about bankrupt and the stock price was around $1.00. Edited August 30, 2015 by Tier2

[cal50]

You complain VEBA success is dependant on the stock market, then say currently the benefit is provided by Ford so its safer. You do understand Ford's success is dependant on the stock market correct? It's not a coincidence that Ford was about bankrupt and the stock price was around $1.00.

 

 

Its not a complaint, its a fact.

 

Ford has investments but a large part of their profit ( and our wages & benefits ) comes from the retail sale of a product we actually build.

Sales take a hit & so does their profit and our wages and benefits.

 

Fords success is more closely linked to sales while VEBA success is largely based on correct investing and market well being.

 

Its almost humorous that the UAW was involved in the "Occupy Wall Street" movement and now they are dependent on WS.

[caustic]

That article is what it is.

 

Nice they are having good returns.

 

What happens when inflation doesn't stay at 3% and investments don't have those nice gains?

 

Let's say for three straight years inflation hits 5% and gains only reach 1.5%?

 

I am not comfortable having my families health insurance tied to the stock market. Unless there will be language that says in bad market times the UAW can promise it will not effect us I say no thanks.

 

Too many what ifs for my liking for something that covers the well being of my children.

[cal50]

What happens when inflation doesn't stay at 3% and investments don't have those nice gains?

 

Let's say for three straight years inflation hits 5% and gains only reach 1.5%?

 

I am not comfortable having my families health insurance tied to the stock market. Unless there will be language that says in bad market times the UAW can promise it will not effect us I say no thanks.

 

Too many what ifs for my liking for something that covers the well being of my children.

 

 

 

The VEBA manager/s walk away , win , loose or draw and we all get put on Obamacare, the crap the UAW supported......

[HigherIQ]

Cecil it is a opinion article and everything on the Internet isn't always true or factual. Tell you what talk to some retired auto workers that actually are in the VEBA especially some that have been retired long enough to be on it when it was company ran and now that the UAW runs it. I actually know retired autoworkers and talk to them. I think that you will find out that the retirees are not happy with the administration of their health insurance by the UAW. That's great if you want to be the defender of everything UAW right wrong or indifferent. Believe it or not some of us actually use our brain to look at all the information and history and things going on in the world and around our country. I am sad for you that you really cannot see how much the world has changed and that you seem to feel like you would be flipping burgers if it wasn't for the UAW. Are you a UAW preferred placement by chance. Believe it or not the majority of people have a good job, health care and are treated fairly at work and believe it or not they are not a member of or protected by a union. A lot of these people actually by new Ford automobiles. How can they make enough money to buy a new Explorer if they are not in a union. Put the things you see going on in perspective. This is a Hail Mary to keep the union dues coming in from the right to work states plain and simple if you really think that it is anyanything more than that you are just lying to yourself. As Dr. PHIL would say Get Real and own it.

[Axle72]

I'll stick with what Walter suggested n fought for also!!! Uaw keep ur hands off my healthcare, what me n my fam have now is fantastic leave it alone!!

[tooltime]

As part of our wages, healthcare is equal to $10.00 per every hour worked according to Center For Automotive Research.

 

Our healthcare just 3 years ago was $7.00 per hour. So UAW negotiated healthcare equals 2,000 hours worked times $10.00 per hour totals $20,000 per year the company pays for our UAW negotiated coverage.

 

Healthcare cost will continue to rise out of control.

 

Doing nothing to control healthcare costs is not an option----

 

One of two things will happen,

 

1) We start paying larger copays and deductibles.

 

or

 

2) Our job security is in jeopardy..................... Mexico investment will prevail

[Tier2]

 

 

Its not a complaint, its a fact.

 

Ford has investments but a large part of their profit ( and our wages & benefits ) comes from the retail sale of a product we actually build.

Sales take a hit & so does their profit and our wages and benefits.

 

Fords success is more closely linked to sales while VEBA success is largely based on correct investing and market well being.

 

Its almost humorous that the UAW was involved in the "Occupy Wall Street" movement and now they are dependent on WS.

If thats the case...why are they a public company? Why don't the Ford family make the company private?

[Decker]

If thats the case...why are they a public company? Why don't the Ford family make the company private?

Family grade stock is just that. Private.

 

Publicly trade shares are the only shares offered. Of course the family shares are both the majority and not in the view of all public exchanges.

 

One thing for sure, you most likely are unaware of the rush to purchase common shares back when the common shares were at a buck or so, the market was buying a lot of the common shares, it wasn`t just those common people or other corporations buying. Nope in one report the family was buying back common shares at depression rates in numbers that had the Bloomberg reporters printing stories about the privatization being possible or very close. Also the speculation was in a lot of print about just who the family was using to hold the stock, because with the tax structure as they are the family would be better off having multiple owners that hold the stock but they control the owners. Buying then (low) was what paid Muloly his stock option for a few years and his exiting stock options were financed in this very smart business manner. (here Allen is your 24 million worth of stock, that the family bought back at maybe a million...smart) The other reason a totally private option is unlikely is the fact that if and when the company takes any loss or any one time charges which shares take the hit? Common or preferred? Once again let the public bare the cost of building the company and let the public bare the losses. Smart, very smart business

 

Does anyone remember what the newly established IUAW administered VEBA administrators did with a very large amount of Ford stock and futures options that was part of the agreement to fund the VEBA? Yep they decided to sell when the shock reached about $1.60 or so. Must of had some heads being scratched on wall street.

 

It is very humorous to think how all the union activists sat around taking their activism about the very process that they had little or no idea was the very back bone of the retirees health care and yes many other benefits. What will the activists protest when the IUAW has a seat on the exchange?

 

To make everyone feel a little better maybe the IUAW can print up something on the order of shares? Then sell these pieces of paper to the members or go public?, then the IUAW could generate more income for the different administrators and clerical employee`s of the new wall street company the IUAWLLC....? Wait a minute... they could just raise the dues again and send out the shares.....?

 

Decker

[Decker]

Cecil,

 

One other thing about Bloomberg, they are good, really good at generalization.....good business technique.

 

They throw out that really big numbers "61 billion" but, did you happen to notice not one reference about yearly expenditures. Going up? As far as any chance of the benefit expenditures ever leveling off... this would only happen when the pool of the beneficiaries stops growing. The pool is a group that isn`t in decline Cecil.

 

Did you happen to notice in the very first paragraph who was mentioned as this move would benefit the most? Yep it states "the automakers, allowing them to shed crushing liabilities that threatened to impede their recovery amid the Great Recession". Did you notice the statement "allowing them to shed crushing liabilities that threatened to impede their recovery" do you see anything missing? Well, did Jeff mention anything other than the corporations recovery? No? that Cecil, is what is known as a half truth in business reporting. What Jeff failed to shed any light on was the shedding of those liabilities made it possible for one thing for sure. That was the guarantee given to the corporations by their business partner to invest the memberships benefits as working capital forrrrr the corporations to use to produce what Cecil? PORFITS yes PROFITS there is no recovery without Profits....Business 101.

 

I have a little business scenario for you to digest. Lets say Ford needed to expand, they don`t want to go to the bank so they do the next best thing. Most business 101 students would state the best business move in this case. Ford would open up a dialog with investors. This would be pitched as an opportunity for the investors to do what? Give their money for a projected return on the investment. You following me? Ok.... The investors "buy" in to the business agreement and the money is wired to wherever and the work on the expansion or improvements are made. Now the investors are watching yes watching their money go to work. Now low and behold Ford takes the improvements and Ford starts producing more products which starts the profits to go up. What do the investors see? The investors not only see their investments working they see a percentage of the profit coming home. Now most investors recoup their initial investment first but they then recoup a percentage of the profit also. This the only way the investors stay in business. Period.

 

Now I know I`m going the long way around the barn but, here goes....

 

Ford sits down with investors or in this cast our business agents. (IUAW) Ford opens a dialog with the business agent so as to pitch the opportunities of the business agents investors to benefit from their investment. (benefit reductions,loss of paid time off, lowering hourly rates) The business agent buys into the plan and invests our benefits and etc. as working capital for the improvements and/or expansions. Now this is where it slides right into carrying a "F" in business 101... Our business agents can`t sell this investment to easily so they do what every business prof will tell you to stay away from. The strong arm tactic. Or in our case our business agent threatening the investors....

 

Then when the strong arm works, the investors (not business agents) investments are wired to wherever and the improvements are made and expansions are done. Then it starts... the products are rolling of the lines at rates never seen before. The plants that investors invested their benefit reductions, paid time off, lowering of hourly rates etc. are doing what? The profits haven`t stopped going up since the investors put up the working capital.

 

I have some questions Cecil... the investments you and every other active and retired UAW member put up as working capital so FORD could make profits (accomplish a recovery as Jeff would call it) is gone, right? Did you or any other member get anything for their initial investment? Now the business agent is back with the same song and dance so the investors will throw in even more working capital.

 

Now I know there will be those that start throwing out the typical response...profit sharing... profit sharing. If you consider "profit sharing" as our return percentage from your investment, right? Then where is our initial investment? Here is a press release "we" are not getting it back. In any business term you can think of, that is a loss. With that said what is our business agent doing? They want even more initial investment by the investors.

 

How many contracts are we going to put up the working capital that the company uses to make those record profits?

 

 

Decker

Edited August 31, 2015 by Decker