Employee Benefits

In a staff position document, FASB amended several statements to conform with pension-reporting requirements of Statement no. 158, Employers’ Accounting for Defined Benefit Pension and Other Postretirement Plans. FASB Staff Position FAS 158-1 also revised implementation guidance for Statement no. 158 and made technical revisions to the statement itself. Statement no. 158 requires that companies recognize in their financial statements the funded status of defined benefit retirement plans. Its amendments to statements 87, 88 and 106, all concerning retirement benefits accounting, did not update the statements’ illustrations in appendices. The staff position document does that. It can be viewed at www.fasb.org/fasb_staff_positions/fsp_fas158-1.pdf .