Several weeks ago, the ERISA Industry Committee (ERIC) published a new proposal for retirement savings in the United States billed as a “New Benefit Platform for Life Security.”
As the first prong, the proposal suggests that there be three types of retirement savings: (1) a defined benefit plan, called a “Guaranteed Benefit Plan,” (2) a defined contribution plan, called a “Retirement Savings Plan” and (3) a short-term security account. These plans could be offered independently or in combination with one another to provide additional retirement resources beyond Social Security.
The Program focuses on providing sufficient incentives to maintain and expand employer participation and encourage individuals to contribute to their own retirement security. If implemented, the program would significantly simplify the current system, ideally make it more equitable to employers and employees and expand participation. The program contains several supplementary initiatives including educational financial planning services, a regulatory program to provide full disclosure of fees and expenses and pre-established limits on both before and after tax contributions for each of the three types of plans.
While the New Benefit Platform for Life Security has much to recommend it, very little has been written about it and few in the benefits practitioner community seem to have noticed it.
You can follow the links here to see a copy of the Core Structure for Life Security Plan (the “Summary”) and a longer version that spells out some of the details (see pages 13-17 of report, found in pages 23-27 of this document).
What do you think of this proposal? Might it be improved by requiring that employers of a certain size actually be required to offer all three types of plans in combination?
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