Charles E.F. Millard

Charles E.F. Millard
Charles E.F. Millard
Nationality	United States
Occupation	Former Director PBGC

Charles E.F. Millard is the former Director of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) and is currently a Managing Director in charge of Pension Relations with Citigroup. He was the first Director of the PBGC to be confirmed by the United States Senate and ran the agency from 2007 to 2009.^[1] As Director, Mr. Millard was the chief executive officer of the PBGC and carried the rank of Under Secretary.^[2][3] He was previously a member of the New York City Council, representing the Upper East Side of Manhattan as a Republican.^[4]

Tenure at the PBGC

During his tenure at PBGC, the agency's deficit shrank from $18.9 billion to $11.2 billion.^[5]

The PBGC is governed by a three-person Board; the Secretaries of Treasury, Commerce, and Labor. In February 2008, the Board adopted a new investment policy presented to it by Millard.^[6] Millard has argued that with very long time horizons, the PBGC should be able to invest in higher return assets. The investment policy was approved in early 2008 by PBGC's board and aims to put 45 percent of the Corporation's $55 billion in equities, 45 percent in fixed income assets, and 10 percent in alternative investments such as private equity and private real estate, replacing the investment policy in place since 2004, which put 75 to 85 percent in fixed income assets, and 15 to 25 percent in equities.^[6] No assets were transitioned into equities during fiscal year 2008^[7][8] and the PBGC only began the transition of some assets from fixed-income to equities in late November 2008.^[8] The New York Times also noted that as of May 2009, the PBGC fund had not fully implemented this transition.^[9]

Peter R. Orszag (then director of the Congressional Budget Office) stated the following about Millard's plan:^[10]

"The change in investment strategy represents an effort on the part of PBGC to increase the expected returns on its assets and to diminish the likelihood that taxpayers will be called on to cover some of its liabilities. The new strategy is likely to produce higher returns, on average, over the long run. But the new strategy also increases the risk that PBGC will not have sufficient assets to cover retirees’ benefit payments when the economy and financial markets are weak. By investing a greater share of its assets in risky securities, PBGC is more likely to experience a decline in the value of its portfolio during an economic downturn—the point at which it is most likely to have to assume responsibility for a larger number of underfunded pension plans."

The new policy is still relatively conservative when compared to private pension funds, according to "Pensions and Investments", a trade publication.^[6] Ron Gebhardtsbauer, former PBGC actuary and head of the Actuarial Science Program at Penn State's Smeal College of Business, stated on June 16th, 2010, "If the PBGC had followed Millard and invested in stocks in 2009, it could have $10 billion more in assets today."^[11]

The New York Times reported that Millard was criticized by the PBGC inspector general for ethical matters related to his tenure as PBGC director. In 2009, Millard relied on his Fifth Amendment right not to testify before a Senate investigative committee, according to an article in the Boston Globe In March 2010, the Inspector General advised Senators Grassley, Baucus, Enzi, and Harkin that her office had completed its investigation with the United States Attorneys Office for the Southern District of New York and that no charges would be filed.^[12][13]

Earlier career

Millard was previously a Managing Director with Lehman Brothers and was a cabinet official in the administration of New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.^[14]

Public Sector

Under Mayor Giuliani, Millard served as President of the New York City Economic Development Corporation^[15] and Chairman of the New York City Industrial Development Agency.^[16]

Millard served on the New York City Council where, in 1992, he drafted legislation to eliminate pornography stores from many New York neighborhoods.^[17]

Millard also ran for Congress in 1994 against Representative Carolyn Maloney. He lost 64% to 35%. His 35% of the vote is ten points higher than that of any Republican candidate in that district since then.^[18]

Private Sector

In the private sector, Millard served as a Managing Director at both Lehman Brothers and Prudential Securities,^[19] and immediately prior to joining the PBGC, Millard was a Managing Director at Broadway Partners, a national real estate investment and management firm in New York.^[20] Millard also served as an attorney with Davis Polk & Wardwell where his activities included constitutional litigation in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.^[21]

Millard was also an op-ed columnist for the New York Post.^[22]

In 1979-80, he worked as a VISTA volunteer in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, and in 1982-83, he served as Legislative Assistant for Foreign Affairs for Congresswoman Millicent Fenwick.^[23]

Education

According to his 2007 profile at the PBGC website, "Mr. Millard holds a B.A. Honors Degree, cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from the College of the Holy Cross and a J.D. from Columbia Law School, where each year he was ranked a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar." ^[24]

Personal

Millard is father of nine children.^[25]

Political Views

"The left in this country is determined to glorify those who hate America no matter what," wrote Millard in a 2006 New York Post column that attacked Riverside Church for its support of what he termed "terror-aiding lawyer Lynne Stewart."^[22]

References

"In Praise of Slow Bureaucracy", http://norris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/15/in-praise-of-slow-bureaucracy/