EDITORIAL: Wall Street shouldn’t Trump retirees
California Secure Choice created a state-managed individual retirement account program for workers whose employers don't offer pensions or 401(k) plans. That may sound mundane, but 6.8 million Californians -- workers at car washes, dry cleaners, in-home supportive services, restaurants -- simply don't have access to the retirement plans that corporate and public sector employees take for granted.
It's an ominous gap in the retirement system. More than 55 million workers nationally lack workplace retirement plans, and many of them face old age with little beyond a meager
So it was a minor triumph when
Now
Most, like Secure Choice, require small businesses to automatically put a tiny percentage of each worker's wagers into a low-cost retirement fund, unless they opt out. That's to create economies of scale, and because studies show the chances a worker will save rise from about 20 percent to 90 percent with auto-enrollment.
In
Initially, business groups and fiscal hawks resisted, but as the measure evolved, they dropped their opposition. By the time Secure Choice was signed by Gov.
Alas, the
They claim the new rules open savings to mismanagement; that businesses will dump existing plans if they can offer the state option; and that taxpayers might end up paying for fund losses. Although there always is some risk in investments, state consumer protections are strict, and employers with private plans would have no reason to drop them. And the program explicitly bans such a bailout.
But this
If the
And it raises an important question: If Republicans can't agree to encourage the working poor to save for retirement, what are their priorities? Voters should put that question to
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