Via Shutterstock

Via Shutterstock

Jeff Bezos is not the first billionaire in the past week to buy his first newspaper. That distinction goes to John Henry, the Boston Red Sox owner who last weekend purchased The Boston Globe.

But Bezos, who bought The Washington Post yesterday in a surprise deal, is doing something for that paper’s employees that Henry is not doing for the Globe’s. Namely, assuming the pension liabilities. However, given the nature of the Post’s pension fund, Bezos doesn’t have any reason to avoid it. The Post’s pension is more than fully funded, with its assets more than $604 million ahead of its outstanding liabilities at the end of 2012, The Wall Street Journal reports.

The big reason the Post’s pension fund is so cushy? Lots of stock in Berkshire Hathaway, the holding company led by super-investor Warren Buffet, which owns 21 percent of The Washington Post Company.

Contrast that with the pension at the Globe. Henry bought the Boston newspaper from The New York Times Company for $70 million, but the Globe’s pension plan has outstanding liabilities of $110 million. The Times is still on the hook for that.