This content is from: Corner Office
The 2015 Pension 40: Sean McGarvey
No. 10 Sean McGarvey, President / North American Building Trades Unions


North American Building Trades Unions
As president of the North American Building Trades Unions, with 13 unions representing more than 2 million workers in the U.S. and Canada, and chairman of the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans (NCCMP), Sean McGarvey, 53, knows the importance of protecting union workers’ retirement savings. He was instrumental to the passage of the Kline-Miller Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014, which allows severely underfunded Taft-Hartley plans to restructure, even if it means retirees and workers take a hit to their pensions. “We all have wants, wishes and desires to save those plans without any pain,” McGarvey says. “Unfortunately, in the economy we live in and the state of our politics, that just isn’t possible. So the question is, How do we do this?” The International Brotherhood of Teamsters’ Central States pension plan quickly filed for restructuring after the bill passed, and McGarvey says he knows of at least four others ready to follow. “Communication is key,” says McGarvey, whose father is among the retirees likely to be affected by benefit changes under the act. For McGarvey the work continues. He’s still hoping to implement a third key element of the legislation before the end of the 2016 session that would offer a new structure for multiemployer plans. McGarvey started working as an apprentice glazer in Philadelphia in 1981, was elected his local’s business representative in 1994, then ascended the union ranks. He’s excited by the Department of Labor’s recent decision to roll back its 2008 guidance on so-called economically targeted investments; he and other labor leaders believe this will help pension plans make financially sound investment decisions while creating jobs for workers. “We feel it’s time industry invested in itself and its members invested in themselves,” he says.
![]() 2. John & Laura Arnold Laura and John Arnold Foundation ![]() 3. Chris Christie New Jersey ![]() 4. Randi Weingarten AmericanFederation of Teachers ![]() 5. Phyllis Borzi U.S. Department of Labor |
![]() 6. Kevin de León California ![]() 7. Alejandro García Padilla Commonwealth ofPuerto Rico ![]() 8. Laurence Fink BlackRock ![]() 9. Rahm Emanuel Chicago ![]() 10. Sean McGarvey North AmericanBuilding Trades Unions |
![]() 11. John Kline Minnesota ![]() 12. J. Mark Iwry U.S. TreasuryDepartment ![]() 13. Damon Silvers AFL-CIO ![]() 14. Jeffrey Immelt General Electric Co. ![]() 15. Joshua Gotbaum Brookings Institution |
![]() 16. Robin Diamonte United Technologies Corp. ![]() 17. Mark Mullet Washington ![]() 18. Terry O'Sullivan Laborers' International Union of North America ![]() 19. Raymond Dalio Bridgewater Associates ![]() 20. Ted Wheeler Oregon |
![]() 21. Thomas Nyhan Central States Southeast and Southwest Areas Pension Fund ![]() 22. Karen Ferguson & Karen Friedman Pensions Rights Center ![]() 23. Randy DeFrehn National Coordinating Committee forMultiemployer Plans ![]() 24. Robert O'Keef Motorola Solutions ![]() 25. Caitlin Long Morgan Stanley |
![]() 26. Kenneth Feinberg The Law Offices of Kenneth R. Feinberg ![]() 27. Orrin Hatch Utah ![]() 28. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend Center for Retirement Initiatives, Georgetown University ![]() 29. Ian Lanoff Groom Law Group ![]() 30. Joshua Rauh Stanford Graduate School of Business |
![]() 31. Ted Eliopoulos California Public Employees' Retirement System ![]() 32. Edward (Ted) Siedle Benchmark Financial Services ![]() 33. Teresa Ghilarducci New School for Social Research ![]() 34. Denise Nappier Connecticut ![]() 35. W. Thomas Reeder Jr. Pension BenefitGuaranty Corp. |
![]() 36. Hank Kim National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems ![]() 37. Paul Singer Elliott Management Corp. ![]() 38. Bailey Childers National PublicPension Coalition ![]() 39. Amy Kessler Prudential Financial ![]() 40. Judy Mares U.S. Labor Department |