Retirement issues were front and center Wednesday in a remote Senate hearing chaired by Senator Rob Portman, R-Ohio.
Titled “Investigating Challenges to American Retirement Security,” it focused on the ongoing “crisis and challenges currently facing Americans preparing for retirement,” as well as legislation introduced by Portman and Senator Ben Cardin, D-Md.—the Retirement Security and Savings Act—which Portman said is specifically designed to help Americans save more for their retirement.
Portman noted that he was a key proponent of the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement (SECURE) Act, which became law as a part of the final FY 2020 funding bill.
The SECURE Act included reforms sponsored by Portman designed to help more Americans save for their retirement. The SECURE Act also included Portman’s Retirement Security Preservation Act to reform pension nondiscrimination laws which “prevented more than 400,000 Americans from having their pensions frozen in January 2020.”
Turning to the Retirement Security and Savings Act, he said it has “broad support, bicameral and bipartisan. In fact, 27 of the Portman-Cardin provisions were included in this new SECURE 2.0 legislation introduced by the Ways & Means Chairman, a Democrat, Richie Neal, and the Ranking Member, Kevin Brady on the House side. If that’s not bipartisan, I don’t know what is.”
He then referenced the four retirement saving challenges he’s encouraging Congress to address.
The first is to help lower-income and part-time workers, “those living paycheck to paycheck that find it tough to set money aside and so we help in that regard in a number of ways.”
The second helps workers employed by small businesses save. Portman noted that less than half of workers employed by small businesses have access to employer-sponsored plans. That compares with 88% of workers employed by large companies.
“Third, we’ve got an issue with the Baby Boomers,” he said. “A few of us on this call would fit into that category. And we just aren’t saving enough as a generation and haven’t been. And therefore, we do some things to help encourage people who are getting ready for retirement, near retirement, to save more.”
Lastly, current laws force Americans to start depleting their retirement savings accounts at age 72 due to required minimum distributions (RMD).
“That’s an issue too, how you ensure that nest egg is adequate for people living longer and healthier lives,” he said.
A key provision of the SECURE 2.0 legislation expected to receive strong consideration from Congress in 2021 would raise the RMD age to 75.