Don't Have a 401(k)? Trump Executive Order Aims to Increase Access for Workers Without Retirement Accounts

Key Takeaways

• President Trump signed an executive order directing the Treasury to create a government website for workers without employer-sponsored retirement plans to access low-cost IRAs.

• Starting in 2027, lower-income workers could qualify for up to $1,000 in contributions from the federal government.

• The policy aims to expand access to retirement savings, but doesn’t include automatic enrollment, which could limit participation.

President Donald Trump directed the Treasury to launch TrumpIRA.gov, a marketplace where workers without employer-sponsored retirement plans can shop for low-cost individual retirement accounts.

The site, set to launch Jan. 1, is part of a proposal Trump offered in his February State of the Union address. Private firms would manage the IRAs, which would come with up to $1,000 in matching contributions.

“For millions of Americans who lack employer-sponsored plans, this will really be revolutionary,” Trump said Thursday as he signed the executive order covering the program.

Why This Matters To You

More than 4 in 10 American workers have no retirement plan at work. TrumpIRA.gov and the Saver’s Match aim to narrow that gap.

The Treasury Department will screen IRAs on the site for cost, investment options, minimum contribution, and balance requirements, Trump said. The new policy will be modeled after the Thrift Savings Plan—a type of retirement plan available to federal workers.

Just half of private industry workers participate in defined contribution plans, according to March 2025 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“Getting 56 million workers into an account with a real federal match is the largest potential expansion of retirement coverage since Social Security,” said Teresa Ghilarducci , an economist and director of the Wealth Equity Lab at The New School for Social Research, in a press release.

The accounts won’t auto-enroll workers, which could limit uptake, said Emerson Sprick, director of retirement and labor policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center.

“The gold standard for retirement savings is an employer-sponsored plan,” Sprick said. “Those plans can leverage automatic enrollment and have advantages over IRAs.”

The order draws on an existing benefit: the federal government’s “Saver’s Match.”

Starting in 2027, lower-income workers will be eligible for up to a $1,000 matching contribution to their retirement accounts. The benefit was created under Secure 2.0, federal legislation passed in 2022.

At the signing, the administration signaled the order was a first step, with further changes requiring congressional action. A bipartisan group of senators last year reintroduced the Retirement Savings for Americans Act, previously introduced in 2023, which could codify how uncovered workers would access retirement plans. That bill has stalled.