‘Mother Of COBRA’ Helps Push Administration’s Financial-Advice Rule
Phyllis Borzi, who drafted large portions of the law that helps workers who lose their jobs keep their health insurance, says that experience helped make her sensitive to the problems many consumers face when looking at retirement savings.
The Wall Street Journal:
Financial-Advice Rule Has An Unlikely Champion
The champion behind an anticipated proposal roiling the retirement-advice industry is a civil servant most Washington outsiders have never heard of. Phyllis Borzi, a 69-year-old assistant labor secretary, is an unlikely advocate for the rule, given the Labor Department doesn’t typically get involved with investment advice. ... She became a congressional staffer in 1979, working on employee benefits. Later, she drafted a large section of the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, a 1985 law that guarantees health benefits at some cost to workers after leaving a job. The work earned her the nickname among Labor Department staff as “the mother of COBRA.” She has said her work in Congress introduced her to many female constituents who were ill-prepared for retirement despite working hard for many years, leading her to conclude the system was flawed. (Hayashi, 4/5)