Coalition to Preserve Retirement Security officials are challenging the findings of an EBRI study that could be used to justify efforts to force all public employees to participate in Social Security.

The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) study, "Social Security Reform: How Benefits Compare," states that, "A far greater portion of all current and future Americans would have a higher initial retiree benefit from the current Social Security program than from an individual account plan if the existing $90,000 wage cap was eliminated and ALL local, state, and federal workers were brought into the program to fill the projected funding deficit." (Emphasis added.) While other groups have proposed including all newly-hired state and local employees, EBRI becomes the first organization in years to advance the idea of bringing all public employees in to fund the Social Security program. (A press release about the study is also available.)

Although EBRI claims to be a nonpartisan research institute that does not take a policy position on any Social Security reform proposal, the inclusion of such a draconian proposal to impose mandatory Social Security coverage for all public employees "for illustrative purposes" poses a serious threat to the retirement security of more than 5 million public employees and an even larger financial threat to their employers. EBRI is a respected source of retirement-related data and its reports are seriously considered by policy makers. Their focus on mandatory coverage presents a major challenge to CPRS and must be taken very seriously.

While stating, "There is no easy answer to 'winners and losers' in Social Security reform: The current system is unsustainable under current assumptions without either benefit or tax changes, and whatever is done – including nothing at all – will affect different people in different ways," EBRI President Dallas Salisbury offered no analysis of who would 'lose' under the proposal to impose mandatory Social Security coverage.

In response to the study, CPRS Chair Terri Bierdeman has strongly urged EBRI to immediately dedicate resources to produce a full analysis of how such a public policy would affect those public employees, their existing retirement programs, their employers and the taxpayers who fund their benefits. In her letter to EBRI President Dallas Salisbury, she reminded him that, "the vast majority of state and local governments will be unable to reduce their current pension funding obligations due to constitutional and contract protections." She stated that CPRS would welcome EBRI's analysis of how state and local governments will absorb this major, new unfunded mandate without a myriad of potential unintended consequences (i.e., major layoffs of public employees, repeal of existing defined benefit programs, reductions across the board in local services, sharp cutbacks in public education, threats to essential public safety services, etc.).

Every CPRS member should immediately contact Mr. Salisbury and express outrage at the way in which this report offers up the retirement security of 5 million public employees without any analysis of how such a change would affect those employees, their current retirement programs, their employers or the taxpayers who would ultimately pay for this new, unfunded federal mandate and demand that they commit to produce such an impact report as soon as possible.

CPRS members should provide copies of any communication with EBRI to CPRS.