Explain the effect of post-employment benefits on the financial statements

For a defined benefit plan the balance sheet shows the funded status: plan assets minus the defined benefit obligation, a deficit being a net liability. Total pension cost for the period equals service cost plus interest cost minus actual return on assets, plus actuarial losses and past service cost, or equivalently, contributions plus the rise in the deficit. Under IFRS, profit or loss carries service cost (including past service cost) and net interest (discount rate times the net liability), while remeasurements go to OCI and are never recycled. Under US GAAP, net income carries service cost, interest cost, expected return and amortisation of amounts held in OCI, with only service cost in operating income. The trap is applying one framework's split to the other.