diff --git a/src/backend/optimizer/util/plancat.c b/src/backend/optimizer/util/plancat.c
index b799e249db8..0f6c121c0db 100644
--- a/src/backend/optimizer/util/plancat.c
+++ b/src/backend/optimizer/util/plancat.c
@@ -1484,12 +1484,12 @@ relation_excluded_by_constraints(PlannerInfo *root,
  * in order.  The executor can special-case such tlists to avoid a projection
  * step at runtime, so we use such tlists preferentially for scan nodes.
  *
- * Exception: if there are any dropped columns, we punt and return NIL.
- * Ideally we would like to handle the dropped-column case too.  However this
- * creates problems for ExecTypeFromTL, which may be asked to build a tupdesc
- * for a tlist that includes vars of no-longer-existent types.  In theory we
- * could dig out the required info from the pg_attribute entries of the
- * relation, but that data is not readily available to ExecTypeFromTL.
+ * Exception: if there are any dropped or missing columns, we punt and return
+ * NIL.  Ideally we would like to handle the dropped-column case too.  However
+ * this creates problems for ExecTypeFromTL, which may be asked to build a
+ * tupdesc for a tlist that includes vars of no-longer-existent types.  In
+ * theory we could dig out the required info from the pg_attribute entries of
+ * the relation, but that data is not readily available to ExecTypeFromTL.
  * For now, we don't apply the physical-tlist optimization when there are
  * dropped cols.
  *
@@ -1524,9 +1524,9 @@ build_physical_tlist(PlannerInfo *root, RelOptInfo *rel)
 				Form_pg_attribute att_tup = TupleDescAttr(relation->rd_att,
 														  attrno - 1);
 
-				if (att_tup->attisdropped)
+				if (att_tup->attisdropped || att_tup->atthasmissing)
 				{
-					/* found a dropped col, so punt */
+					/* found a dropped or missing col, so punt */
 					tlist = NIL;
 					break;
 				}