UC-AFT Local 1474 UCB/UCSF

In our opinion, best practices must be followed before making the important decisions about restarting UCRP contributions. We believe that the Regents, as fiduciaries of the $42 billion UCRP, have not had the benefit of projections and analyses that would constitute best practices for making this type of decision.

By Robert Weil, UC-AFT Field Representative and Part-time/Part-year Lecturer, UCSC

When people think of Social Security, they usually have in mind a universal plan that every working person is supposed to get - even those casual employees who do not have any other form of pension. Yet at the very time when President George W. Bush and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger have been trying to dismantle Social Security and state retirement plans and replace them with privatized systems, few people seem aware that the University of California already denies both the federal and state plans to large numbers of its part-time and part-year employees, including hundreds of lecturers and librarians. These members of the UC work force have never even had the right to Social Security or other retirement plans that most workers, and especially, but by no means only, many elderly and retired, are now so fearful of losing.

Yee’s bill would require public discussions on executive compensation by UC Regents

SACRAMENTO – A bill requiring public meetings for all discussions regarding executive compensation at the University of California (UC) was approved on a bipartisan 6-1 vote today in the State Senate Committee on Education.

by Howard Ryan

Many part-time employees at the University of California, and also at many community colleges, are being denied the most basic form of retirement security afforded to other American workers: social security. UC denies social security (SS) coverage to any employee with an appointment of less than 50% of full time. The SS-excluded employees are denied participation in the University's defined-benefit pension program as well. In lieu of social security, and in accordance with federal law, UC requires these employees to participate in a defined contribution plan (DCP), and a 7.5% contribution is deducted from their paychecks; UC makes no contribution to the DCP.