Even after Caitlin Long, Morgan Stanley’s head of corporate strategies and pension solutions, advised on pension-risk-transfer deals for General Motors Co. and Verizon Communications in 2012, she remained uncertain about what the two transactions meant for corporate America and retirees. Now that she has helped Motorola Solutions and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. pull off similar deals, Long says the “ball is rolling” for U.S. companies transferring pension obligations to insurers. New mortality tables from the Society of Actuaries, which Morgan Stanley estimates raise companies’ liabilities by 4 to 10 percent, was a triggering event. Motorola settled $3 billion in pension obligations for 30,000 employees with Prudential Financial at par, meaning it transferred assets to the insurer without paying a premium; its stock rose 2.5 percent the day of the announcement. “Corporate America is going down this path because of the economics,” says Long, 45, who started her financial career in life insurance equity research at Credit Suisse. “Insurance companies have more scale than any single corporate pension fund, and they can offset longevity risk with their life insurance business. No corporation has that natural hedge.” Though Bristol-Myers didn’t disclose the economics of its $1.4 billion transaction, its plan was overfunded at the end of 2013, and the drugmaker didn’t have to contribute cash to settle the deal. New York–based Long, 45, has a JD and a master’s in public policy from Harvard University. She’s been focusing on pensions since then–Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack offered her the pension position in 2007.
1  | 2  | 3  | 4  | 5  |
| Bruce Rauner Illinois | John and Laura Arnold Laura and John Arnold Foundation | Randi Weingarten American Federation of Teachers | Rahm Emanuel Chicago | David Boies Boies, Schiller & Flexner |
6  | 7  | 8  | 9  | 10  |
| Randy DeFrehn National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans | Damon Silvers AFL-CIO | Laurence Fink BlackRock | Chris Christie New Jersey | Robin Diamonte United Technologies Corp. |
11  | 12  | 13  | 14  | 15  |
| Ted Eliopoulos California Public Employees’ Retirement System | John Kline Minnesota | J. Mark Iwry U.S. Treasury Department | Gina Raimondo Rhode Island | Phyllis Borzi U.S. Labor Department |
16  | 17  | 18  | 19  | 20  |
| Orrin Hatch Utah | Abigail Johnson Fidelity Investments | Ted Wheeler Oregon | Caitlin Long Morgan Stanley | James Hoffa International Brotherhood of Teamsters |
21  | 22  | 23  | 24  | 25  |
| Amy Kessler Prudential Financial | Alejandro García Padilla Puerto Rico | Christopher Klein U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Caifornia | Steven Rhodes Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Michigan | Kevin de León California |
26  | 27  | 28  | 29  | 30  |
| David Draine Pew Charitable Trusts | Jordan Marks National Public Pension Coalition | Sam Liccardo California | Joshua Rauh Stanford Graduate School of Business | Karen Ferguson and Karen Friedman Pension Rights Center |
31  | 32  | 33  | 34  | 35  |
| Timothy Blake Moody’s Investors Service | Kathleen Kennedy Townsend Center for Retirement Initiatives, Georgetown University | Edward (Ted) Siedle Benchmark Financial Services | Daniel Loeb Third Point | Judy Mares Employee Benefits Security Administration, U.S. Labor Department |
36  | 37  | 38  | 39  | 40  |
| Andrew Biggs American Enterprise Institute | Andy Stern Columbia University | Kenneth Mehlman KKR & Co. | Teresa Ghilarducci New School for Social Research | A. Melissa Moye U.S. Treasury Department |