If you are a municipal employer in New York State struggling to find the answer to that question, you are not alone. In the absence of express language in your collective bargaining agreement, a definitive response is...more
On August 7, 2019, in Kelly v. Honeywell International, the Second Circuit handed down the latest decision in a series of cases across the country on a company’s obligation to provide lifetime health care to retirees....more
In its latest case addressing retiree health benefits, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has held that a collective bargaining agreement’s general durational clause controls when retiree healthcare benefits end. Zino v....more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Over the last several years, the law governing disputes on lifetime retiree health benefits in the Sixth Circuit has had many twists and turns....more
Collective bargaining agreements, including those that establish ERISA plans, should be interpreted according to ordinary principles of contract law, the U.S. Supreme Court has reaffirmed in a per curiam opinion. CNH...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Disputes over lifetime retiree health benefits for union retirees may become a memory of the past. For the second time in three years, the Supreme Court confirms that collective bargaining agreements must...more
A federal district court in Ohio dismissed retirees’ claims for lifetime healthcare benefits from Honeywell. Honeywell provided healthcare benefits to plaintiffs through a series of collective bargaining agreements and,...more
In a contract governed by federal law, does “The End” really mean “The End”? Some federal courts have said “no,” but the U.S. Supreme Court has just said “yes.” Most contract cases in federal court involve the...more
In a contract governed by federal law, does “The End” really mean “The End”? Some federal courts have said “no,” but the U.S. Supreme Court has just said “yes.” ...more
In M&G Polymers USA, LLC v. Tackett, 135 S. Ct. 935 (2015), the Supreme Court of the United States addressed the interpretation of collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) that include post-retirement welfare benefits, such as...more
The Supreme Court cast a ray of sunlight for employers by rejecting the use of a problematic inference in adjudicating claims for retiree benefits brought pursuant to collective bargaining agreements. For many years, the...more
In M&G Polymers USA, LLC v. Tackett, the United States Supreme Court invalidated a judicial presumption - commonly referred to as the Yard-Man presumption - that union retiree health care benefits are vested for life in the...more
In 2000, M&G Polymers purchased the Point Pleasant Polyester Plant in Apple Grove, WV. At that time, M&G entered into a collective-bargaining agreement and a related Pension, Insurance, and Service Award Agreement (P & I...more
The Supreme Court’s recent unanimous decision in M&G Polymers USA, LLC v. Tackett, No. 13-1010, 2015 WL 303218 (S. Ct. January 26, 2015) confirms that ordinary principles of contract law should be observed when interpreting...more
The New Year holiday is barely over and 2015 has delivered its first significant development affecting manufacturers and their labor unions. On January 26, 2015, in M&G Polymers U.S.A. v. Tackett, a unanimous United States...more
Last week, the United States Supreme Court issued a decision that gives unionized employers in Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee, and Kentucky greater ability to modify medical benefits they provide to retirees pursuant to current...more
For the past quarter century, because of conflicting legal authority, employers who offer health care to their retirees, particularly in a unionized setting, have struggled to determine whether they can alter those benefits....more
In M&G Polymers v. Tackett, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that ordinary contract principles govern whether a collective bargaining agreement vests retirees in health coverage (and the contributions they are required to pay for...more
Ordinary contract principles govern disputes about collectively bargained retiree medical benefits. A Morgan Lewis team secured a major victory for employers when the U.S. Supreme Court, in M&G Polymers USA, LLC v....more
In a decision watched closely by both employers and unions, a unanimous Supreme Court has resolved a thirty-plus year split among the circuit courts on the standards governing claims for retiree health-care benefits arising...more
On Monday, a unanimous United States Supreme Court issued its decision in M & G Polymers USA, LLC v. Tackett, Supreme Court Case No. 13-101, vacating and remanding the Sixth Circuit’s holding that a group of retirees was...more
In M&G Polymers USA, LLC v. Tackett, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned three decades of precedent by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, unanimously ruling that, when no specific provision in a...more
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Sixth Circuit’s reliance on retiree-friendly inferences set forth in UAW v. Yard-Man are incompatible with ordinary principles of contract interpretation and should not be used when...more