In: Accounting
Pensions Address the following elements in the form of a memo to your CEO: A. From AMAZON’s financial information, what type of pension plan does it have? Discuss the reasons why AMAZON has chosen this particular plan. B. What was the effect of the pension plan on AMAZON's financial statements? Defend your response. C. Your CEO has informed you—the controller of AMAZON—that the board of directors has made the decision to look at other options of types of retirement plans. Investigate what other alternatives would be available, and determine which would be appropriate for your particular company.
To: The CEO
From:
Subject: Pensions
Date:
In this memo report, I will provide a critical analysis of the different types of pension plan and its implications on the financial performance of the company.
A.
AMAZON’s company contributes to several multi employer pension plans based on obligations emerging from collective bargaining agreements. AMAZON’s company has the defined benefit plans, which helps in accounting for the future pension income of the employees. The company uses this plan as it makes it easy to obtain the obligation and expenses associate with the company’s pension plans and other post retirement benefits. The company also accounts for the defined benefit plans, which aims at protecting the interest of the employees in future.
B.
The contributions to the defined benefit plans have significant negative effect the company’s financial statements. For instance, the contributions made to the plans reduces the amount of money which could be transferred to the retained earnings and thus, reducing the overall equity in the company. Additionally, the contributions are costly to the company as it very lowers the total assets within the company.
C.
Other options of types of retirement plans available to the company includes the individual retirement arrangements, simple IRA plans, payroll deduction IRAs, money the purchase plans, and the employee stock ownership plans(ESOPs). I think it is appropriate for the company to use the employee stock ownership plans, as it is designed to give the qualifying employees securities of the company. This would motivate the employees to work to improve the overall financial performance of the company.