Increasing Access to Workplace Retirement, Guaranteed Lifetime Income
Dec 16, 2025
Increasing Access to Workplace Retirement, Guaranteed Lifetime Income
Dec 16, 2025
In the past several years, Congress advanced significant legislation designed to enhance Americans’ retirement security including the SECURE Act and SECURE 2.0.
These bills improved retirement savings opportunities for millions of Americans. Still, many workers do not have access to a workplace retirement account. More can be done, and Congress is taking action.
ACLI commends Representative Richie Neal, the House Ways and Means Committee’s Ranking Member, on the reintroduction this week of his retirement plan coverage bill, the Automatic IRA Act of 2025. The bill guarantees that workers at businesses with 10 or more employees have access to a retirement plan with automatic enrollment, if they do not already. The bill also ensures more workers have access to a lifetime income distribution option through their retirement accounts. Annuities are the only true lifetime income product in the marketplace — one that guarantees retirees won’t outlive their retirement savings.
This bill would go a long way toward filling the current workplace retirement plan access gap. The percent of private-sector employees having access to a defined contribution plan is estimated to soar from 70.0% to 95.4%. All told, ACLI estimates that more than 34 million additional American workers will gain access to workplace retirement plans and more than 24 million will participate, if this legislation becomes law. This could boost the retirement savings of American workers by nearly $160 billion, including an estimated $64 billion in employer contributions.
Adding an annuity option to a retirement plan could ease the concern of many Americans who fear running out of money in retirement. Research from economists Mark Warshawsky and Gaobo Pang finds that retirees who fully or partially annuitize their retirement savings fare better in retirement outcomes than those who opt for the traditional strategy of annual withdrawals of 4 percent. In fact, people retiring with savings of less than $250,000 would benefit most from annuitizing higher portions of their retirement savings, if not all of it.
Andrew Remo
Andrew Remo serves as Vice President, Retirement Security for the American Council of Life Insurers. In this capacity, he plays a leading role in advocating for policies that help people access the tools they need to save and ensure those savings last a lifetime. Previously, Andrew worked on these issues for the American Retirement Association and on Capitol Hill.
