Thursday, April 12, 2007

The Motion Picture Industry Pension Plan

Narrowcast time. I spent the day in Cathedral City attending a meeting between IATSE (that's the international union to which TAG belongs) and the AMPTP (Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.) We got a long report on the health of the Motion Picture Industry Pension and Health Plan, and here's a few factoids you should know:

* The Pension Plan sends monthly checks to over 11,000 retirees.

* The Plan has over 2500 participants who have more than $100,000 in their Individual Account Plans.

* Investment income for the Plan totalled $516 million in 2006.

* The "Defined Benefit" part of the Industry Pension Plan (the part that spits out monthly checks to retirees year after year) has had annual earning of 9.8% over the past two decades.

* The Individual Account Plan (this is the part of the plan that is an investment account for each participant) has earned 9.2% for the last twenty years.

* Plan actuaries project that a plan participant who started in the Plan in 1997 and works 2000 per year over twenty years will have $250,000 in her/his Individual Account Plan account at the time or retirement.

* Over thirty "2000 hour" years, money in a participant's I.A.P. account will grow to $500,000*.

* This assumes no further increases in IAP contributions and a 3% cost-of-living wage increase over that twenty (or thirty) year span.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've been full time employed in the union since 1990. How do I find out where I stand in the plan?

Steve Hulett said...

I think the easiest way is call the Motion Picture Industry Pension Plan.

(818) 769-0007 (ext. 627)

Give them your SSN. Ask them what your Individual Account Plan is. Ask them what your "Defined Benefit" is.

Anonymous said...

So the defined benefit number is what I am eligible to receive as a monthly check, is that correct?

Jeff Massie said...

So the defined benefit number is what I am eligible to receive as a monthly check, is that correct?

Yes. The Plan can give you a statement of that amount if and when you are vested.

In every third quarter of the year (July-October), anyone who earned a "qualified year" (400+ hours) in the previous 12 months is supposed to get a pension statement in the mail.

If you worked more than 400 hours and didn't get a statement last fall, contact the Pension Plan at the above number, make sure they have your current address, and have them send you a statement.

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