Improving retirement security by expanding the Saver’s Match

This piece is part of a collection of retirement policy proposals launched at the September 30, 2026 event, “ The next generation of reforms to the retirement saving system “.

本文是 2026 年 9 月 30 日“下一代退休储蓄制度改革”活动中推出的一系列退休政策提案的一部分。

You can view the entire collection here .

您可以在此处查看整个集合。

Tax-preferred defined contribution (DC) plans are now the primary vehicle through which federal policy subsidizes retirement savings, with associated tax expenditures totaling approximately $276 billion in 2019 (Congressional Budget Office 2021).

税收优惠固定缴款 (DC) 计划目前是联邦政策补贴退休储蓄的主要工具，2019 年相关税收支出总计约 2760 亿美元（国会预算办公室 2021 年）。

Despite the massive expenditure, access to employer-sponsored plans remains uneven.

尽管支出巨大，但获得雇主赞助计划的机会仍然参差不齐。

Around 36 million private sector workers in the U.S. did not have access to an employer-sponsored retirement plan in 2025 (Bureau of Labor Statistics 2025).

到 2025 年，美国约有 3600 万私营部门工人无法享受雇主资助的退休计划（劳工统计局 2025 年）。

For those who have access, the value of tax benefits for DC plans varies widely: An individual in the top tax bracket receives roughly $35 in immediate tax savings per $100 contributed, while a worker in a lower tax bracket might receive $10 or less for the same contribution.

对于那些有机会获得 DC 计划的税收优惠价值差异很大：最高税级的个人每缴纳 100 美元即可立即节省约 35 美元的税款，而较低税级的工人每缴纳 100 美元可能会获得 10 美元或更少的税收优惠。

For the lowest-income workers, the traditional tax exclusion often provides no benefit.

对于收入最低的工人来说，传统的免税政策往往没有带来任何好处。

Several developments heighten the policy relevance of these structural features.

一些发展增强了这些结构特征的政策相关性。

First, while mortality trends vary across groups, overall life expectancy has risen, extending the retirement horizon and increasing required savings (Social Security Administration 2026).

首先，虽然不同群体的死亡率趋势有所不同，但总体预期寿命有所上升，从而延长了退休期限并增加了所需的储蓄（社会保障管理局，2026）。

Whereas in 1950, the mean life expectancy at age 65 was 14 years, today it has grown to nearly 20 years.

1950 年，65 岁的平均预期寿命为 14 岁，如今已增长至近 20 岁。

This extension of the expected postretirement lifespan has increased the need for savings, as longer retirements require greater accumulated wealth to maintain living standards.

预期退休后寿命的延长增加了储蓄的需求，因为更长的退休时间需要更多积累的财富来维持生活水平。

Second, the projected depletion of the Social Security trust fund increases the need to strengthen alternative savings vehicles.

其次，社会保障信托基金的预计枯竭增加了加强替代储蓄工具的必要性。

The latest report from the Social Security Board of Trustees projects that the program’s trust fund will be exhausted in 2032 (Social Security Administration 2026).

社会保障董事会的最新报告预计该计划的信托基金将于 2032 年耗尽（社会保障管理局 2026）。

Policymakers should seek complementary strategies to improve retirement security outside Social Security if benefit cuts are implemented.

如果实施福利削减，政策制定者应寻求补充战略，以改善社会保障之外的退休保障。

Third, the explosion in artificial intelligence (AI) investment and projected rise in productivity has prompted concerns of a shift in national income from labor to capital and given rise to calls for more broadly sharing the gains from AI.

第三，人工智能（AI）投资的爆炸式增长和生产率的预期上升引发了人们对国民收入从劳动力转向资本的担忧，并引发了更广泛地分享人工智能收益的呼声。

Under such a scenario, a broader distribution of capital—particularly equity ownership by low- and middle-income households—can help mitigate rising inequality and diminished returns to labor.

在这种情况下，更广泛的资本分配——特别是中低收入家庭的股权——可以帮助缓解不平等加剧和劳动力回报减少的问题。

And lastly, a growing body of academic literature finds that tax incentives for DC plans yield limited net new savings, with most benefits accruing to higher-income households that would likely have saved in the absence of the incentive.

最后，越来越多的学术文献发现，DC 计划的税收激励措施产生的净新储蓄有限，大部分福利都归于高收入家庭，如果没有激励措施，这些家庭可能会储蓄。

The economics literature suggests that the incentives raise net savings by only a minuscule share, implying that it may be more accurate to characterize the DC system as a hybrid transfer program—a system that functions more as a wealth transfer to higher-income households than as a mechanism for generating new savings—rather than a pure savings incentive.

经济学文献表明，这些激励措施仅提高了很小一部分的净储蓄，这意味着将 DC 系统描述为混合转移计划（该系统更多地充当向高收入家庭的财富转移而不是产生新储蓄的机制）而不是纯粹的储蓄激励可能更准确。

Indeed, the consensus around the economic impact of DC plans has evolved as the accounts became more widespread.

事实上，随着账目变得更加广泛，围绕 DC 计划的经济影响的共识已经演变。

Studies conducted early in the DC expansion established an optimistic baseline for the efficacy of tax incentives for retirement savings and suggested that tax-preferred retirement accounts were effective instruments for increasing household wealth accumulation (Feldstein 1995; Poterba, Venti, and Wise 1995, 1996, and 1998).

在 DC 扩张早期进行的研究为退休储蓄税收激励的有效性建立了乐观的基线，并表明税收优惠退休账户是增加家庭财富积累的有效工具（Feldstein 1995；Poterba、Venti 和 Wise 1995、1996 和 1998）。

However, studies employing more rigorous controls for participant heterogeneity and selection bias reached opposite conclusions, often finding that DC plans represented limited net additions to household saving (Gale and Scholz 1994; Engen, Gale, and Scholz 1996; Engen and Gale 2000; Benjamin 2003).

然而，对参与者异质性和选择偏差采用更严格控制的研究得出了相反的结论，经常发现 DC 计划对家庭储蓄的净增加有限（Gale 和 Scholz 1994；Engen、Gale 和 Scholz 1996；Engen 和 Gale 2000；Benjamin 2003）。

More recent research has reinforced this finding, suggesting that these tax preferences primarily induce portfolio reallocation rather than increased savings (Chetty et al.

最近的研究强化了这一发现，表明这些税收优惠主要导致投资组合重新分配，而不是增加储蓄（Chetty 等，2017）。

2014; Beshears et al.

2014年；贝希尔斯等人。

2017).

2017）。

One study even suggested that the substantial annual federal cost of the subsidies could be reducing national savings once the resulting larger budget deficits are factored in (Gale and Orszag 2004).

一项研究甚至表明，一旦将由此产生的更大的预算赤字考虑在内，每年大量的联邦补贴成本可能会减少国民储蓄（Gale 和 Orszag 2004）。

From a distributional perspective, the consequences of tax-preferred DC plans are highly regressive.

从分配的角度来看，税收优惠 DC 计划的后果是高度累退的。

Updated figures show that the top two quintiles together receive roughly 84% of the subsidy, compared with a mere 1.3% going to the bottom quintile (Congressional Budget Office 2021).

最新数据显示，排名前两位的五分之一人口总共获得了大约 84% 的补贴，而排名靠后的五分之一人口仅获得了 1.3% 的补贴（2021 年国会预算办公室）。

These annual distributional patterns persist when examined over the lifetime.

当在一生中进行检查时，这些年度分布模式仍然存在。

Microsimulation analyses find that the bottom 40% of households receive only single-digit shares of the tax subsidies for retirement savings over their careers, while half of all benefits flow to the top 10% (Burman et al.

微观模拟分析发现，底层 40% 的家庭在其职业生涯中仅获得个位数的退休储蓄税收补贴，而一半的福利流向顶层 10%（Burman 等，2016）。

2004).

2004）。

The structure of these tax preferences creates what amounts to a transfer to top earners and motivates various proposals to redirect tax incentives for retirement savings toward moderate- and low-income households.

这些税收优惠的结构相当于向高收入者转移，并激发了各种建议，将退休储蓄的税收激励政策转向中低收入家庭。

Reallocating a portion of this expenditure to more effective matches or mandatory savings mechanisms could improve retirement preparedness without increasing net fiscal costs.

将部分支出重新分配给更有效的匹配或强制性储蓄机制可以在不增加净财政成本的情况下改善退休准备。

Given both the minimal effects on net savings and the regressive distributional patterns of existing tax preferences for DC plans, researchers have explored revenue-neutral reforms that would exchange high-income tax benefits for more progressive matching contributions.

考虑到对净储蓄的影响极小，以及 DC 计划现有税收优惠的递减分配模式，研究人员探索了收入中性改革，将高收入税收优惠换成更具累进性的匹配缴款。

One frequently cited approach would replace current deductions with a uniform refundable credit providing a government match of approximately 30% on contributions (Gale, Gruber, and Orszag 2006).

一种经常被引用的方法是用统一的可退还信用额取代当前的扣除额，为政府提供约 30% 的捐款匹配（Gale、Gruber 和 Orszag 2006）。

While transitioning the benefit to a matching credit would increase net-savings among low- and middle-income households, it would almost certainly prove politically intractable and could have negative unintended consequences—including potentially diminished retirement plan coverage for workers if firms cancelled their plans in the wake of the reform.

虽然将福利转变为配套信贷将增加中低收入家庭的净储蓄，但几乎肯定会在政治上变得棘手，并可能产生意想不到的负面后果——包括如果企业在改革后取消计划，工人的退休计划覆盖范围可能会减少。

The flat-rate matching credit approach also entails substantial transition costs.

统一利率匹配信贷方法还需要大量的过渡成本。

This essay, adapted from a recently published article in Tax Notes (Harris and Sarin 2026), lays out three options to make the Saver’s Match even more progressive by pairing an expanded match with modest saving-related offsets.

这篇文章改编自《税务笔记》最近发表的一篇文章（Harris 和 Sarin 2026），提出了三种选择，通过将扩展匹配与适度的储蓄相关抵消相结合，使储蓄匹配更加进步。

From a broad perspective, our proposal can be seen as an incremental step toward the flat-rate matching credit.

从广泛的角度来看，我们的建议可以被视为迈向统一利率匹配信贷的渐进步骤。

In comparing these proposals, the flat-rate matching credit would upend the retirement savings landscape, boosting the retirement saving benefit for roughly four-fifths of savers, whereas the plan we present below would be much more targeted.

在比较这些提议时，统一利率匹配信贷将颠覆退休储蓄格局，提高大约五分之四储户的退休储蓄福利，而我们下面提出的计划将更有针对性。

On the flipside, our plan could plausibly be included in SECURE 3.0 legislation and would largely maintain the existing DC landscape—without the complicated political and logistical issues associated with a flat-rate matching credit.

另一方面，我们的计划可能会被纳入 SECURE 3.0 立法中，并且将在很大程度上维持现有的华盛顿特区景观，而不会出现与统一利率匹配信贷相关的复杂的政治和后勤问题。