Among the large companies receiving taxpayer reimbursements for pensions and in some cases retirement health care are Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. To the degree that these companies work both for the government and private industry, their reimbursable pension costs are limited to their federal contracts.

Company financial reports detail the amounts recorded as recoveries from the government each year. Lockheed Martin’s, for example, shows reimbursements of $3.45 billion over the last five years: $3.1 billion came from United States taxpayers. During that period, the company generated $21.8 billion in operating profits. As a percentage of these profits, Lockheed Martin’s reimbursements have averaged 16 percent over these years.

The company says that most of its employees are covered by traditional, defined benefit pension plans; 84 percent of its $46 billion in sales last year were made to the United States government.

The amounts that the government is obligated to pay these companies have been rising — not surprising, given the market declines of 2008 and 2009 and punishingly low interest rates. In 2010, the government reimbursed Lockheed by $988 million, an amount equal to 24 percent of the company’s operating profit that year. For 2011, Lockheed expects a reimbursement of $900 million.

At the end of last year, Lockheed’s pension was underfunded by $10.4 billion, according to generally accepted accounting principles. As Lockheed contributes money to make up for this shortfall, the government will reimburse it.

At Raytheon, the story is similar. It recently projected that its government reimbursement would grow from $666 million in 2010 to $819 million in 2012 and $917 million in 2013. Its pension was underfunded by $4 billion at the end of last year.

It’s not just the rank and file workers who receive pension subsidies from the government. Contributions to high-level executives’ pensions are also embedded in these reimbursements. At Lockheed Martin, the present value of accumulated pension benefits for the top five executives totaled around $40 million in 2010, according to the company’s financial filings.