REEF Act would exempt RRB insurance account from automatic budget cuts

The U.S. Senate Budget Committee yesterday approved the proposed Railroad Employee Equity and Fairness (REEF) Act, which would permanently exempt railroad workers’ unemployment and sickness insurance benefits from mandated sequestration cuts.

S. 1274 was introduced by U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) with original co-sponsors Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.).

Nearly 200,000 active railroad workers are eligible for unemployment and sickness benefits from the Railroad Retirement Board's (RRB) Unemployment Insurance Account. The RRB is subject to sequestration, which reduced railroad unemployment and sickness insurance benefits by 5.7% beginning on May 10, 2023.

"No other unemployed workers face these kinds of cuts. No one ever should," said Budget Committee Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) in a press release. The REEF Act would ensure that affected railroad workers would receive their benefits, he said.

The legislation has been endorsed by all of rail labor and is supported by the rail industry, according to the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO (TTD). For more than a decade, rail workers have been "unfairly targeted by federal cuts to their benefits," TTD President Greg Regan and TTD Secretary-Treasurer Shari Semelsberger said in a press release.

"In 2013, rail workers were singled out by the Budget Control Act and subjected to sequestration of their unemployment and sickness insurance program benefits — despite the fact the railroads and workers were the sole contributors to the program. No taxpayer or federal dollars were spent, nor saved, through the reduction of these benefits," they said. "Without further congressional action, these harmful reductions will last until 2031."