{"id":197874,"date":"2026-05-20T14:34:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T14:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/197874\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T14:34:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T14:34:09","slug":"philadelphia-to-become-first-city-to-implement-auto-ira-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/197874\/","title":{"rendered":"Philadelphia to Become First City to Implement Auto-IRA Program"},"content":{"rendered":"

Philadelphia voters approved the establishment of a city-run program that would automatically enroll thousands of workers in individual retirement accounts, making it the first city to implement a program that has become increasingly popular at the state level.<\/p>\n

City residents established the Philadelphia Retirement Savings Board to oversee the PhillySaves program, which targets workers who don\u2019t have access to an employer-sponsored retirement plan. With 99% of the vote in, 78% of voters backed<\/a> the measure on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Eligible employees must work for Philadelphia businesses that have operated for at least two years and don\u2019t offer a retirement plan. Self-employed workers aren\u2019t eligible to enroll. Mayor Cherelle Parker signed legislation in January to establish PhillySaves, but it required voters to approve the creation of the board.<\/p>\n

The initiative is the latest push from local, state, and federal officials<\/a> to address the lack of retirement savings among the more than 50 million Americans without an employer-sponsored plan. Pew Research found in 2023 that approximately 208,000 private sector workers in Philadelphia didn\u2019t have access to a retirement plan through their employer.<\/p>\n

Those eligible would be automatically enrolled into a Roth IRA with a default contribution of between 3% and 6%. They can opt out or change their contribution amount if they choose.<\/p>\n

The city\u2019s retirement savings board will be made up of nine members: Four appointed by the mayor, four by the City Council president, and one chosen by the city controller. The board will oversee a private investment firm to establish the retirement accounts for workers in the program.<\/p>\n

Pew Charitable Trusts estimated<\/a> it would cost the city up to $1 million in expenses to get the program up and running, and roughly $500,000 each year after.<\/p>\n

Philadelphia is the third city to approve an auto-IRA program, but is poised to become the first to fully implement it. New York City and Seattle previously approved auto-IRA initiatives, but they were later folded into state-run plans.<\/p>\n

There are 22 states that have enacted either voluntary or mandatory state-facilitated retirement savings programs. Pennsylvania hasn\u2019t approved a state-wide program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Philadelphia voters approved the establishment of a city-run program that would automatically enroll thousands of workers in individual…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":197875,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[87796,16145,87795,69,71,70,87794],"class_list":["post-197874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-benefits-eligibility-and-enrollment","tag-election-results","tag-employee-financial-planning","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-roth-iras"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197874"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197874\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}