Meyer v. UST-United States Trustee (In Re Scholz)

Robert and Carolyn Scholz have filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 13 of the Bankruptcy Code. The question before us is whether the Scholzes may exclude an annuity Mr. Scholz receives under the Railroad Retirement Act of 1974(RRA) when calculating their “projected disposable income,” which determines the amount they must repay creditors to qualify for Chapter 13 relief. The Scholzes contend the annuity must be excluded because the RRA provides that payment of such annuities shall not be “anticipated.” In the Scholzes’ view, calculating their projected disposable income based on the expectation that Mr. Scholz will continue to receive the annuity “anticipates” its payment and is therefore barred by the RRA. In our view, that reading of the statute is foreclosed by the Supreme Court’s construction of the term “anticipated” in Hisquierdo v. Hisquierdo, 439 U.S. 572 , 99 S.Ct. 802 , 59 L.Ed.2d 1 (1979).

I

The relevant facts may be briefly summarized. Mr. Scholz, a retired railroad employee, receives annuity income under the RRA of several thousand dollars per month. When the Scholzes filed their Chapter 13 petition, they were required to calculate their “current…