Lehman Files for Bankruptcy, Merrill Sold discusses the recent news involving Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Merrill Lynch & Co., who were both mentioned after the Bear Stearns sale as being companies that were more than 25% employee-owned. UPDATE: Lehman Workers Brace For The Worst discusses the impact of the Lehman bankruptcy on the employees and once again uses a broad brush to paint employee ownership negatively:
A further blow is that about 25% of Lehman is employee-owned, which means that most employees lost their savings as well as their job.
"Shareholders are toast," Jay said, and strongly criticized employee-stock ownership plans in general.
"From an employee standpoint, it's one of the worst things to get," he said. " You're definitely taking on more risk if you work for an entity that pays you in part with stock."
We recently experienced More of the Same overly sensational anti-ESOP coverage of the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailouts. It is essential that the ESOP community continue to Counter Negative ESOP Coverage with the Facts. While we wait to learn more about the employee ownership details of Lehman Brothers, keep the following in mind:
- Studies have shown that a typical ESOP participant has about three times the total retirement assets of a non-ESOP participant.
- Studies have shown that ESOP companies are more likely to have another diversified retirement plan than non-ESOP companies.
- A typical ESOP participant has diversified assets about equal to those of the non-ESOP participant.
1 comments:
Michael Keeling, President of The ESOP Association, and I wanted to thank you for a great post. You're spot on.
Amy Gwiazdowski, Director of Communications, The ESOP Association.
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