Compliance with ERISA’s disclosure provisions

A sample of large employee-benefit plan sponsors revealed that while respondents each paid plan consultants about $769,000 per year to help them comply with the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), more than half did not comply with selected provisions of the law. Across the sample, differential levels of spending on compliance were not associated with the likelihood of compliance. Rather, benefit directors’ human capital as measured by years of experience, along with government audits, were the chief determinants of compliance. The presence of unions did not contribute to compliance with ERISA in the single employer plans studied herein, possibly because industrial unions, like plan sponsors, face information blockages. The author thanks Ann Bartel, Victor Goldberg, Frank Lichtenberg, Eli Noam. Donna Sockel, and Gene Martin. This article is derived from the author’s doctoral dissertation.