The 2015 Pension 40: Jeffrey Immelt

No. 14 Jeffrey Immelt, Chairman and Chief Executive / General Electric Co.

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< The 2015 Pension 40: The Long Climb

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14
Jeffrey Immelt
Chairman and Chief Executive / General Electric Co.
Last year: Not ranked

For the past five years, General Electric Co.’s Jeffrey Immelt, 59, has been perhaps the highest-profile CEO to tackle what he described in 2010 as a “drag” on his company’s earnings: corporate pensions. In 2011, GE shuttered its defined benefit plan to new employees and changed how it reported pension outlays. But the problem persists. With $48 billion in assets, GE has the fourth-largest corporate defined benefit plans in the U.S. and is running a $15.8 billion deficit. This year, after union negotiations and cuts to health care payments for beneficiaries over 65, Immelt spoke about the “headwinds” of large annual benefit costs at GE’s annual meeting: “We always want our pension plan to be strong and supported, and it’s that way today. And it will always be that way.” Critics point out that Immelt and other executives are eligible for a so-called supplementary pension plan if they remain with GE until age 60. Even as the company was cutting health care outlays, Immelt’s pay doubled in 2014, to $37.3 million, largely thanks to an $18.4 million rise in the value of his pension payout and deferred pay, which the company attributed to changing interest rates and an actuarial adjustment. As of 2014, after 32 years at GE, Immelt had accumulated $1.8 million in the defined benefit plan; $70.3 million in the supplementary plan, which is unfunded; and $1.78 million in a third retirement fund. In September, GE announced it was selling its $115 billion asset management business, which oversees pension investments and other assets — part of a larger retreat from financial services. The proceeds, which could be as much as $500 million, will go toward the defined benefit obligation.


The 2015 Pension 40 Click below to view profiles

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1. Bruce Rauner
Illinois

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2. John & Laura Arnold
Laura and John Arnold Foundation

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3. Chris Christie
New Jersey

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4. Randi Weingarten
AmericanFederation of Teachers

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5. Phyllis Borzi
U.S. Department of Labor

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6. Kevin de León
California

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7. Alejandro García Padilla
Commonwealth ofPuerto Rico

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8. Laurence Fink
BlackRock

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9. Rahm Emanuel
Chicago

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10. Sean McGarvey
North AmericanBuilding Trades Unions

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11. John Kline
Minnesota

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12. J. Mark Iwry
U.S. TreasuryDepartment

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13. Damon Silvers
AFL-CIO

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14. Jeffrey Immelt
General Electric Co.

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15. Joshua Gotbaum
Brookings Institution

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16. Robin Diamonte
United Technologies Corp.

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17. Mark Mullet
Washington

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18. Terry O’Sullivan
Laborers’ International Union of North America

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19. Raymond Dalio
Bridgewater Associates

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20. Ted Wheeler
Oregon

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21. Thomas Nyhan
Central States Southeast and Southwest Areas Pension Fund

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22. Karen Ferguson & Karen Friedman
Pensions Rights Center

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23. Randy DeFrehn
National Coordinating Committee forMultiemployer Plans

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24. Robert O’Keef
Motorola Solutions

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25. Caitlin Long
Morgan Stanley

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26. Kenneth Feinberg
The Law Offices of Kenneth R. Feinberg

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27. Orrin Hatch
Utah

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28. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend
Center for Retirement Initiatives, Georgetown University

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29. Ian Lanoff
Groom Law Group

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30. Joshua Rauh
Stanford Graduate School of Business

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31. Ted Eliopoulos
California Public Employees’ Retirement System

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32. Edward (Ted) Siedle
Benchmark Financial Services

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33. Teresa Ghilarducci
New School for Social Research

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34. Denise Nappier
Connecticut

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35. W. Thomas Reeder Jr.
Pension BenefitGuaranty Corp.

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36. Hank Kim
National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems

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37. Paul Singer
Elliott Management Corp.

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38. Bailey Childers
National PublicPension Coalition

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39. Amy Kessler
Prudential Financial

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40. Judy Mares
U.S. Labor Department


Karen Ferguson Randy DeFrehn Jeffrey Immelt Kevin de León Kenneth Feinberg
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