“We must work towards educating American workers on the necessity of retirement saving and helping, not by mandating small businesses to provide employees with retirement benefit plans.” – House Committee on Small Business Ranking Member Sam Graves

By Raymund Flandez

Small businesses are having a harder time meeting their obligations in offering retirement benefits for their employees, with two stark choices facing them: shut their doors or end their contributions, according to testimony at yesterday’s hearing before the House Committee on Small Business.

Witnesses urged the Committee to look into these solutions:

– Consider measures to cap the amount of losses employers are responsible for covering during market downturns.

– Encourage unlimited pre-funding of defined benefit plans during “good” times so that there is less strain during the “bad” times.

– Make employee IRAs mandatory.

– Raise the age for required minimum distributions from 70.5 to 75, since many people are working longer.

– Create an annual tax credit to reward small employers that continue to maintain retirement plans and contribute to the plans. Read more…

Related:

Zogby: Two-thirds of Americans (63%) put their trust in small businesses and entrepreneurs to lead U.S. out of recession.

Rasmussen: 59% Still Believe Government Is the Problem

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