More companies are freezing employee pension plans, a trend that is likely to continue throughout the year, USA Today reported.

At least 16 companies already have announced plans to freeze pensions this year, compared with 18 companies that said they would freeze their pension plans during all of 2008.

Last week, Wells Fargo & Co. told its employees that their pension plans would stop accruing benefits effective July 1, which usually means the company will not contribute any more money.

Den Battle, director of tax policy for the National Association of Manufacturers, said more companies will halt pension benefits unless Congress temporarily relaxes funding requirements.

“When your funding obligations triple and you don’t have the cash to deal with that and you don’t get relief from Congress, you have to make hard choices,” Battle said.

Some pension-rights advocates believe relief should only be given to employers that agree not to freeze company-match programs.

“Congress will be hesitant to provide pension-fund relief without assurance that employers would protect benefits of rank-and-file employees and not divert funding relief to other uses,” such as corporate bonuses, said Sandra Salstrom, a spokeswoman for North Dakota Congressman Earl Pomeroy, a Democrat who is drafting a pension relief bill.

However, Battle believes a lot of employers would be hesitant to accept the terms of a pension relief bill, claiming the current retirement system has “always been voluntary (and) we work very hard to preserve that.”