Treasury Ends Obama-Era Program to Help Workers Save for Retirement
By TARA SIEGEL BERNARDJULY 28, 2017
An Obama-era program that created savings accounts to help more people put away money for retirement
is being shut down by the Treasury Department, which deemed the program too expensive.
The myRA program was deemed a conservative way to save because account owners could not lose money, though they would not see the potential returns
that come with a diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds.
The myRA program has cost $70 million since 2014, according to Treasury, and would cost $10 million annually going forward.
The funds were invested in United States Treasury savings bonds, which paid the same variable rate as
the Government Securities Fund, available to federal employees through the government retirement plan
The 30,000 participants in the program, known as myRA
and intended for people who did not have access to workplace savings plans, will receive an email on Friday morning alerting them of the closure.
Since then, about 20,000 accounts have been opened with participants contributing a total
of $34 million, according to the Treasury, with a median account balance of $500.