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Retire plans pushed

President seeks to expand access

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama will pitch some new proposals to expand access to retirement savings accounts and revisit some old ones when issuing his budget next month.

Many Americans are not well prepared for retirement, with nearly one in three yet to retire having any savings or pension available for their later years, according to a Federal Reserve report.

The White House says Obama’s proposals, if enacted, would provide more than 30 million people access to a retirement account.

The biggest chunk of that increase would occur through legislation requiring employers that don’t offer a retirement plan to automatically enroll their workers in an Individual Retirement Account. The employers that did so would get a tax credit of $3,000 to help them offset the administrative expense. The proposal was also part of last year’s budget, but Congress did not pass it.

On the new front, Labor Secretary Thomas Perez says the administration will seek to make it easier for multiple employers to join together to offer retirement plans. For small employers. That would mean lower administrative expenses.

Perez said that employers with a common bond, say auto dealers, can now pool together to offer a retirement plan. He said the president will recommend doing away with the “common bond” requirement and let people from all kinds of businesses join together. The White House says it’s recommending that Congress pass legislation that would ensure the long-term sustainability of such arrangements.

A few states have recently approved state-run retirement plans for private-sector workers. The Obama administration says it wants to encourage those efforts.

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