Supporters of the bill, primarily Democrats, say it will save the pensions of more than a million Americans and prevent those retirees from having to rely on taxpayer-funded social safety net programs. Without the bill, employers will increasingly be forced to decide between hiring employees and staying in pension plans, with employer withdrawals putting additional cost pressure on employers who remain to make up for the contributions of those employers who withdrew. That increase in liability will impair employers' ability to access credit, thereby increasing the cost of borrowing and stifling their ability to grow and create jobs. Simply allowing the multiemployer pension system to collapse would cost hundreds of billions of dollars, therefore the bill's provisions will save the nation money. And they argue that the bill will be budget-neutral in the long run because the multiemployer plans that take out loans will eventually repay them.

Opponents of the bill, primarily Republicans, say it does not make failing pension plans more stable or solvent over time and will not end pension plan underfunding. They say that forcing plans to accept crushing balloon payment loans they can never hope to repay only hurts workers, businesses and taxpayers, calling the bill a bailout for certain multiemployer pension plans that were improperly managed — which they say should be Congress' legislative focus. They point out that the bill undermines a key bipartisan agreement enacted in 2014 which has begun to address the multiemployer pension crisis by cutting benefits in order to allow the pension plans to regain solvency over time, saying any new legislation should build on those provisions. They also say the bill doubles down on the untenable assumption that the government can fully guarantee pension promises that were based on unrealistic assumptions of 7-8% annual returns.