The risks and challenges facing Americans today with regards to financial security and retirement readiness are well documented and widely reported.  Fortunately, there’s also a wide array of improvements and solutions being discussed in multiple sectors by different stakeholders.

This report (based on expert interviews held October – December, 2019) starts by summarizing the issues and analyses for assessing Americans’ retirement readiness. It then analyzes and compares various proposed programs that could help improve the financial security of Americans, with a special focus on programs that aim to enhance retirement preparedness. It includes an Evaluation Framework that policy-makers could use to compare and analyze various proposals.

Our intended audience for this report is decision-makers and influencers, including policy-makers for government, non-profit and for-profit sectors, as well as other research analysts.

As noted in the report, we face significant challenges to our retirement security. As a society, we are in uncharted waters, with a large part of the population anticipating long periods in retirement.

We know that no single program can address these challenges—it will take several programs and solutions to make progress. We also understand that none of the steps described in this report will be easy. However, we believe the work that must be undertaken to implement any potential solutions to fulfill these expectations is an appropriate price to pay for the longer lives that many people expect today.