Pension Plan Financial Help ‘Buys Time’ But Won’t Last 30 Years

Billions of dollars some of the country’s most underfunded union-brokered plans are getting from the federal government’s private-sector pension insurer won’t last them the 30 years President Joe Biden promised, investment consultants say.

Instead, pension plans applying for and receiving special financial assistance funding are walking a tightrope to stretch out newly reinstated benefits as long as possible while balancing rising interest rates against future liabilities and legacy assets they already have.

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. has already approved more than $6 billion for about two dozen underfunded multiemployer pension plans, according to agency records. That’s a tenth of ...