AB 550

Under current law, with exceptions, participating employees in the Wisconsin

Retirement System (WRS) must pay all employee required contributions that are

used to fund their retirement benefits. This bill requires employers to pay WRS

employee required contributions for participating employees who are activated to

serve on military duty in the U.S. armed forces and the commitment is for a period

of more than 30 days. Under the bill, the contributions must be based on the earnings

that the participating employee would have received from the employer had the

participating employee not been activated to serve on military duty.

The bill also provides that an employer may recover from the employee's

earnings paid after the employee is reemployed by the employer the contributions

paid for the employee. In recovering the contributions, the employer may not deduct

from the employee's earnings more than 5 percent of each payment of earnings,

unless otherwise provided in a voluntary written agreement between the employer

and employee.

Because this bill relates to public employee retirement or pensions, it may be

referred to the Joint Survey Committee on Retirement Systems for a report to be

printed as an appendix to the bill.