Nationwide Financial stated support for the launch of the small businesses add value for employees (SAVE) act, which will make it easier for small businesses to establish and maintain a retirement plan for their employees.
According to Nationwide, the SAVE Act legislation will help small businesses and their employees in improving retirement plan access. The act helps alleviate the coverage issue by encouraging small businesses to pool together to offer multiple small employer plans that are much less expensive than single employer plans.
In addition, the act also helps in maintaining fiduciary protection by encouraging plan sponsors to work within the current defined contribution system, this legislation extends important fiduciary protections that do not exist with other retirement accounts to millions of Americans. It also enables small businesses transition to a traditional 401(k) retirement plan as the business matures.
Kirt Walker, president and COO of Nationwide Financial, said: “To help solve the current retirement crisis, we need to work together to improve access to retirement plans for all Americans. The SAVE Act contains innovative and thoughtful provisions that will remove many of the barriers that prevent small businesses from offering their employees a retirement plan.”
Anne Arvia, senior vice president of retirement plans at Nationwide Financial, said: “The SAVE Act adds important ideas to the retirement policy arena and helps provide greater access to retirement plans for small businesses.
“With fifty percent of our country’s workers currently without access to an employer-based retirement plan Nationwide strongly supports initiatives like this that will help increase the retirement security for all Americans.”