894
Opinion of the Court
who would otherwise have been laid off to depart voluntarily. Brief for Respondent 11.
We do not see how obtaining waivers of employment-related claims can meaningfully be distinguished from these admittedly permissible objectives. Each involves, at bottom, a quid pro quo between the plan sponsor and the participant: that is, the employer promises to pay increased benefits in exchange for the performance of some condition by the employee. By Spink's admission, the employer can ask the employee to continue to work for the employer, to cross a picket line, or to retire early. The execution of a release of claims against the employer is functionally no different; like these other conditions, it is an act that the employee performs for the employer in return for benefits. Certainly, there is no basis in § 406(a)(1)(D) for distinguishing a valid from an invalid quid pro quo. Section 406(a)(1)(D) simply does not address what an employer can and cannot ask an employee to do in return for benefits. See generally Alessi v. Raybestos-Manhattan, Inc., 451 U. S., at 511 (ERISA "leaves th[e] question" of the content of benefits "to the private parties creating the plan. . . . [T]he private parties, not the Government, control the level of benefits").6 Furthermore, if an employer can avoid litigation that might result from laying off an employee by enticing him to retire early, as Spink concedes, it stands to reason that the employer can also protect itself from suits arising out of
6 Indeed, federal law expressly approves the use of early retirement incentives conditioned upon the release of claims. The Older Workers Benefit Protection Act, Pub. L. 101-433, 104 Stat. 983 (1990), establishes requirements for the enforceability of employee waivers of ADEA claims made in exchange for early retirement benefits. See 29 U. S. C. § 626(f). Of course, the enforceability of a particular waiver under this and other applicable laws, including state law, is a separate issue from the question whether such an arrangement violates ERISA's prohibited transaction rules. But absent clearer indication than what we have in § 406(a)(1)(D), we would be reluctant to infer that ERISA bars conduct affirmatively sanctioned by other federal statutes.
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