Free Republic

TIAA-CREF, a Fortune 100 financial-services organization that employs 12,500 workers in more than 100 local offices, announced a "special, one-time Voluntary Retirement Program" on Tuesday in a memo to its employees. The company is offering this "opportunity" to people age 50 and older who have at least 10 years' tenure at the company, or at least five years' tenure for those 55 and up. Eligible employees who choose to participate will receive unspecified financial incentives. We received a copy of the memo from an anonymous tip. TIAA-CREF confirmed the existence of the program and declined to comment further, emphasizing that...

A resolution calling for the boycott of Israeli firms will not be put to a vote at TIAA-CREF’s upcoming shareholders meeting. The move comes after the pension fund giant received approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to “take no action” on a submission by pro-Palestinian activists. This followed the company’s warning by an Israeli civil rights group that passage of the resolution would violate NY and Federal law. Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, director of Shurat HaDin – Israel Law Center, stressed that the development was “a major defeat for the extremist Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement taking aim at Israel.”...

TIAA-CREF officials are asking the SEC to allow it to take no action on a shareholder proposal by activist group Jewish Voice for Peace that would require it to consider divesting from companies that contribute to violations of human rights, including companies whose business supports Israel's occupation of the West Bank. Jewish Voice of Peace filed a shareholder proposal with the College Retirement Equities Fund on Feb. 8 that was signed by 200 investors, requesting that shareholders be allowed to vote on the issue at CREF's July annual meeting. The date and location of the meeting have not yet been...

Outrage: How Obama Supporters TIAA-CREF Is Screwing This American TIAA-CREF (Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association - College Retirement Equities Fund) is one of the largest financial services companies in the United States, with $398 billion in assets under management as of September 30, 2008. On June 28, 2007, the California State Teachers' Retirement System (CalSTRS) announced its selection of TIAA-CREF as the sole investment provider for its supplemental retirement savings programs. CalSTRS is the second-largest public pension plan and the largest teachers' retirement fund in the United States. Given that the overwhelming majority of teachers and college professors have their...

The economy is so dire that President Obma has created an economic advisory board. Austan Goolsbee as staff director and chief economist; William H. Donaldson, SEC Chair, 2003-05; Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., president and CEO, TIAA-CREF; Robert Wolf, chairman and CEO, UBS; David F. Swensen, CIO, Yale University; Mark T. Gallogly, founder and managing partner, Centerbridge Partners L.P.; Penny Pritzker, chairwoman, Pritzker Realty Group; Jeffrey R. Immelt, CEO, GE (parent company of NBC News); John Doerr, partner at Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers; Jim Owens, chairman and CEO, Caterpillar Inc.; Monica C. Lozano, publisher & chief executive officer, La Opinion;...

One of the most persistent themes in Noam Chomsky’s work has been class warfare. He has frequently lashed out against the “massive use of tax havens to shift the burden to the general population and away from the rich” and criticized the concentration of wealth in “trusts” by the wealthiest 1 percent. The American tax code is rigged with “complicated devices for ensuring that the poor—like 80 percent of the population—pay off the rich.” But trusts can’t be all bad. After all, Chomsky, with a net worth north of $2,000,000, decided to create one for himself. A few years back...

I have been harrassed, followed, suffered property damage and the introduction of substances into my home and vehicle that have been making my family (my 10 year old son and I) ill for over 2 years, I purchased a small bungalow on the south side of Chicago in a neighborhood at the southeast most tip of Chicago that borders Lake Michigan and a lakefront park. The parties involved: I believe are individuals from city government agencies (Department Water and Sewer, Department of Planning, Purchasing, Police Department), It seems that there is interest in this area and I believe there is...

By Aldo Svaldi Denver Post Business Writer Retirement plan manager TIAA-CREF laid off more than 500 workers Monday, 70 in Denver, in a streamlining move. "We were looking to basically restructure the organization to better serve customers," said Stephanie Cohenglass, a spokeswoman for the New York-based money management firm. TIAA-CREF employs 6,000 people, including 1,200 in Denver after the cuts. Overall, the firm dismissed 8 percent of its workforce. In Denver, the cuts focused on information technology workers, Cohenglass said. TIAA-CREF maintained 27 different computer servers in multiple languages, an amount the company determined was excessive, she said. After they...