RETIREMENT PLANS

Our subsidiaries participate in a qualified 401(k) defined contribution plan under which employees may contribute a percentage of their salary. Employees are eligible to participate upon their first day of employment. Under this plan, we match 100% of the first 6% that the employee defers. During the second quarter of 2018, we made a one-time discretionary contribution of $0.9 million to the vast majority of our employees following the tax reform that was enacted in December 2017. Additionally, we may provide a performance-based company contribution of up to 3% if we exceed annual financial goals. Our contribution expense is presented in the following table:

TABLE 12.1



	Nine Months Ended September 30,
(in thousands)	2018		2017
401(k) contribution expense	$	11,210	$	9,081

We also sponsor an Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) Excess Lost Match Plan for certain officers. This plan provides retirement benefits equal to the difference, if any, between the maximum benefit allowable under the Internal Revenue Code and the amount that would have been provided under the qualified 401(k) defined contribution plan, if no limits were applied.

Additionally, we sponsor a qualified non-contributory defined benefit pension plan and two supplemental non-qualified retirement plans that have been frozen. Although not required, we made a $4.0 million contribution to the non-contributory defined benefit pension plan during the third quarter of 2018 in order to meet the minimum funding requirements of this plan. The net periodic benefit credit for these plans includes the following components:

TABLE 12.2



	Three Months Ended September 30,						Nine Months Ended September 30,
(in thousands)	2018			2017			2018			2017
Service cost	$	(3	)	$	(3	)	$	(11	)	$	(11	)
Interest cost	1,549			1,463			4,669			4,417
Expected return on plan assets	(2,946		)	(2,427		)	(8,736		)	(7,281		)
Amortization:
Unrecognized prior service cost	1			2			1			6
Unrecognized loss	596			603			1,842			1,859
Net periodic pension credit	$	(803	)	$	(362	)	$	(2,235	)	$	(1,010	)