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PBGC Report Points to a Retirement System Solution that Already Exists
Writing in the Consolidation Corner blog, RCH’s Tom Hawkins draws attention to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC)'s recent report to Congress (Feasibility of Expanding PBGC’s Missing Participants Program) which found that converting PBGC's existing program into a national consolidator of small retirement balances would require substantial new systems, resources, and expertise. Importantly, the PBGC report recognizes that private-sector solutions have already emerged to address the problem, indirectly referring to RCH, PSN and auto portability. Consistent with the PBGC’s report, Hawkins concludes: “public policy can support, encourage, and accelerate the development of a comprehensive clearinghouse network that keeps workers connected to their savings throughout their careers.”
The Plumbing Our Country’s Retirement System Needs
Writing in the RCH Consolidation Corner blog, RCH President & CEO Spencer Williams argues that the U.S. retirement system suffers from costly “leaks” because workers frequently change jobs and cash out small retirement balances rather than keep their savings invested. Using a plumbing analogy, Williams explains that the industry has evolved from basic “one-to-one” transfers to more sophisticated “one-to-many” platforms, but to truly preserve retirement savings it needs a “many-to-many” clearinghouse that allows assets to move seamlessly among plans through shared technology and reciprocal connections. Williams contends that this infrastructure is increasingly important as retirement savings vehicles become more diverse and as public policy initiatives such as the Saver’s Match are implemented. He points to Auto Portability, enabled by the Portability Services Network (PSN), as proof that a true clearinghouse model can operate successfully at scale, helping keep savings in the retirement system, reduce account fragmentation, and improve long-term retirement outcomes.
Retirement Savings Portability – An Idea Whose Time Has (Finally) Come
Writing in RCH’s Consolidation Corner, Tom Hawkins takes stock of five recent, broad-based developments that, taken together, make a compelling case that full retirement savings portability is getting closer to becoming a reality. Key developments Hawkins describes include: 1) auto portability and the rise of the Portability Services Network, 2) key government retirement savings initiatives, 3) potential provisions of SECURE 3.0, 4) an increased focus on “forgotten” accounts and 5) expanding the portability of Roth balances.
RCH Consolidation Corner Channel Ep. 27 - Modeling the Future of the Saver's Match Program
In this episode, we review the results of an incredibly important and highly relevant research report on the Saver’s Match Simulation, a ten-year discrete-event simulation model developed by Retirement Clearinghouse (RCH) to explore how the Saver’s Match Program would operate in the real world, under a specific solutions model.
Modeling the Future of the Saver's Match Program
As the Saver’s Match Program must soon transition from legislative concept to operational reality, one question looms larger than any other: how will the Program operate at scale, in the real world, across tens of millions of people annually, thousands of institutions, and billions of federal dollars? Retirement Clearinghouse (RCH) offers a response to this question as we simulate a specific solutions model for the Saver's Match, examining its impact under four scenarios executed over a 10-year period. Download the full research report here.
Financial Literacy and the Power of Preservation
Writing in the RCH Consolidation Corner blog, Tom Hawkins shares his impressions from the 3/31/26 SPARK Champions for Financial Literacy event in Washington, DC, which kicked off Financial Literacy Month. Hawkins notes the impressive line-up of speakers, including policy headliners Kevin Hassett, Director, National Economic Council and Luke Pettit, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Institutions, and many others – all sharing relevant personal and professional experiences that spoke directly to the transformative power of financial literacy. However, it was the address by RCH President & CEO Spencer Williams, whose laser focus on savings preservation and his passionate advocacy for the building out of a “neutral, industry-scale clearinghouse” that could wind up being the most consequential message delivered at the event. Williams’ full speech is included in the article.
The Saver’s Match Program is Missing a Crucial Component
Writing in the RCH Consolidation Corner blog, RCH president & CEO Spencer Williams examines the critical infrastructure that will be required to support the Saver's Match Program. When the program goes live in 2027, the volume of direct deposits from the U.S. Treasury into 401(k) plans and IRAs will require technology infrastructure that can handle millions of transactions on a timely basis every year. Every transaction will require locating a taxpayer’s retirement savings account, matching the identities of the taxpayer and accountholder, and transporting the contribution from the U.S. Treasury into the active account. That's why having the infrastructure in place to seamlessly, effectively, and securely facilitate the millions of Saver’s Match contributions will be essential to the program's success.
Building Out the Clearinghouse Our Retirement System Demands
On March 5, 2026, Retirement Clearinghouse (RCH) released a landmark whitepaper – Building Out Clearinghouse Services for the U.S. Retirement System: A Blueprint for a Digital Infrastructure. In this article, RCH's Tom Hawkins, a co-author of the paper, summarizes the high-level, compelling case for expanding the set of clearinghouse services beyond auto portability, and explains why this initiative is absolutely required in order to "create a retirement ecosystem that does what it should have done all along: protect workers’ savings as they move through their careers, not lose them along the way."
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