Supreme Court sides with company seeking to shift health costs to retirees

A unanimous Supreme Court is ordering lower courts to take a new look at a dispute over a chemical company's efforts to cut costs in its health plan for retired workers.

Justice Clarence Thomas on Monday wrote the court's opinion that threw out a judgment in favor of the retirees of the Point Pleasant Polyester Plant in Apple Grove, West Virginia. M&G Polymers USA LLC is the current owner of the facility.

Lower courts ruled that some retirees had been promised lifetime, cost-free health benefits.

The Supreme Court did not decide whether the courts came to the right conclusion, only that they employed faulty legal reasoning in interpreting a 15-year-old agreement dealing with retiree pensions and other benefits.

The case is M&G Polymers USA LLC v. Tackett, 13-1010.