The Department of Labor (DOL) is developing a ‘Retirement Savings Lost and Found’ database to help workers locate missing workplace retirement plans, such as 401(k)s.
The database's purpose is to help workers find lost retirement accounts if, say, they switch jobs or their employer goes bankrupt. The database has not launched yet but is expected to go live by December 29. Currently, the DOL is collecting data and information from retirement plan administrators and recordkeepers to supply the database.
“Our goal, which we believe plan sponsors and administrators and their service providers share, is to make sure that workers and their beneficiaries receive all the retirement benefits they earned and were promised,” said Lisa Gomez, assistant secretary for Employee Benefits Security.
An estimate by Capitalize, a fintech company that assists in rollovers, found that in May 2023, there were more than 29 million forgotten 401(k) accounts worth more than $1.6 trillion.
And that's probably why SECURE 2.0, a federal retirement law, directed the DOL’s Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) to establish the database.
Whenever workers leave or switch jobs, their retirement funds may be automatically cashed out (if the balance is less than $1,000), left in the plan, or rolled over into another retirement account (either automatically or voluntarily), which can be confusing and time-consuming.
And it's not just old 401(k) s that investors forget about. Once that money is rolled over into an IRA, sometimes investors make the mistake of letting it sit in cash equivalent investments such as money market funds instead of actively investing and losing out on big potential gains compounded over many years.
David John, a senior strategic policy advisor at AARP, notes that some retirement recordkeepers—like Vanguard and Fidelity—have already established a program to help workers move their old 401(k) to their new employer’s retirement plan. However, the government's program may be more accessible, he said.
"We still need a much simpler system to enable people to move their money from employer to employer," he said.
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