In RETIREMENT HEIST:  How Companies Plunder and Profit from the Nest Eggs of American Workers, award-winning Wall Street Journal reporter, Ellen E. Schultz reveals what we have long suspected: that companies have been routinely cutting back on retirement benefits, not because they can’t afford to pay them, but often in order to enrich highly paid executives and win over stockholders.  Aided and abetted by many players in the retirement industry–benefit consultants, insurance companies, and banks–the benefits of American workers have been shrinking so that others can benefit.

A little over a decade ago, most companies had more than enough set aside to pay benefits earned by two generations of workers.  But by exploiting loopholes, ambiguous regulations, and new accounting rules, companies have essentially turned their pension plans into piggy banks, tax shelters and profit centers.

“The world needs more…reporters like Ellen E. Schultz,” proclaims The New York Times while AARP states:  “It is hard to read the incendiary new book, RETIREMENT HEIST, without getting angry.” Nell Minnow, co-founder, the Corporate Library, author of Watching the Watchers: Corporate Governance for the 21st Century adds: “Ellen Schultz documents the biggest heist in history, all the more horrifying because it is legal. Accounting tricks, perverse tax incentives, and bonus-hungry executives have taken the retirement money that Americans have saved over decades.  Meticulously researched and as gripping as a crime novel, this is essential reading for anyone who has, had, or hopes to have a job.” –Nell Minnow, co-founder, the Corporate Library, author of Watching the Watchers: Corporate Governance for the 21st Century.

Ellen E. Schultz has been a investigative reporter covering the retirement crisis for more than a decade.Her reporting has led to congressional hearings, proposed legislation, and investigations by the Treasury and the Government Accountability Office.  She has won many awards for economics, financial and investigative reporting, including three Polk Awards, two Loeb Awards, and a National Press Club award.  In 2003, she was part of a team of Wall Street Journal reporters who won a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on corporate scandals.  She lives in New York City.

Ellen Schultz in the media:

COMEDY CENTRAL “THE DAILY SHOW”—Taped in-studio interview  Monday 10/17

http://www.thedailyshow.com/

NPR “MORNING EDITION”—Taped interview aired Thursday 9/29.

http://www.npr.org/2011/09/29/140344871/retirement-heist-how-firms-trimmed-pensions

NPR “DIANE REHM”—Live in-studio interview Thursday 10/5.

http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-10-06/ellen-schultz-retirement-heist

C-SPAN “BOOK TV”—Taped talk aired Saturday 10/1 and Sunday 10/2.

http://www.booktv.org/Watch/12833/Retirement+Heist+How+Companies+Plunder+and+Profit+from+the+Nest+Eggs+of+American+Workers.aspx
CNN “CNN NEWSROOM”—Live in-studio interview Tuesday 10/18.

MSNBC-TV “DYLAN RATIGAN SHOW”—Live in-studio interview Thursday 9/15.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31510813/#44540575