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Employee Benefit Plans (Policies)
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2017
Retirement Benefits [Abstract]  
Pension And Postretirement Medical And Life Benefit Obligations
Our pension and postretirement benefit liabilities represent the funded status of the present value of benefit obligations of our employee benefit plans. We develop pension, postretirement medical and life benefit costs from actuarial valuations. We establish actuarial assumptions to anticipate future events and use those assumptions when calculating the expense and liabilities related to these plans. These factors include assumptions management makes concerning expected investment return on plan assets, discount rates, health care costs trend rates, turnover rates and rates of future compensation increases, among others. In addition, we use subjective factors such as withdrawal and mortality rates to develop actuarial valuations. Management reviews and updates these assumptions on an annual basis. The actuarial assumptions that we use may differ from actual results due to changing market rates or other factors. These differences could affect the amount of pension and postretirement medical and life benefit expense we will recognize in future periods.