The Inefficiencies of Existing Retirement Savings Incentives

Teresa Ghilarducci () and Christian Weller ()

No 2015-02, SCEPA publication series. from Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), The New School

Abstract: The growing retirement crisis results, in part, from inefficient savings incentives embedded in the U.S. tax code. In a joint issue brief with the Center for American Progress (CAP), CAP Senior Fellow Christian Weller and SCEPA Director Teresa Ghilarducci find that households that need the most help saving for retirement receive the least assistance from the multitude of savings incentives in the U.S. tax code, for three reasons. First, existing savings incentives can be incredibly complex. Second, savings incentives often benefit higher-income earners more than middle- and lower-income earners. Third, the public loses out on tax revenue that otherwise would have been collected. Tax reform is needed to simplify savings incentives and better target incentives.

Keywords: Retirement; Social Security; Tax; Saving (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 E21 H55 J26 J32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 18 pages
Date: 2015-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age, nep-mac and nep-pbe
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:epa:cepapb:2015-02

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