Maurice, the reason the take-home cash is important is because (a) Uncle Sam, related to Uncle Al, requires a big slug of the take-home for his various activities, (b) the labourers cannot count on their pensions, under perpetual WAT-WOT conditions, to be there when needed, because (c) the pension funds are not there to start with, unless the companies fund up, which of course would hurt other companies pension funds as stock price comes down ...
dailyreckoning.com
For example, during the fiscal year ending October 31, 2001, Deere & Co., the tractor company, expected its pension plan and post-retirement benefit plans to produce investment gains of $657 million. In actuality, however, these plans had losses of $1,419 billion. That's a difference of more than $2 billion! These latest losses bring Deere's underfunded pension liability to more than $3 billion. "At some point," observes Apogee Research, "Deere will have to deposit actual cash into its underfunded pension plan to make up the $3 billion shortfall. And yes, that's real money to Deere...$3 billion represents more than five years' worth of average net income!"
Investors should be aware that Deere is not the exception.
Mental image of the festive drunken characters parading on stilts accompanied by loud and disorienting music while being pestered by playful small kids wanting to kick the stilts out from under, even as bigger kids are throwing tomatos from topside balconies ... ooh, and watch out for that banana skin ahead;0)
Chugs, Jay |
