Retirement Savings Bills Include LSAs

In a statement reacting to introduction of the legislation, Frank Keating, president and CEO of the American Council of Life Insurers, said, “As a nation with a personal savings rate of only 2%, we believe incentives are needed to boost Americans long-term retirement savings, adding that, creation of RSAs and ERSAs “represents positive developments.”

Keating said that “with some minor changes to the ERSA proposal,” ACLI could strongly support both RSAs and ERSAs.

However, Keating said, in repeating comments made several times over the years as conservatives pressed for LSAs, these “represent the one proposal that raises significant concerns and ACLI cannot support because it would not boost long-term savings.

“It would divert before-retirement savings into accounts that could be easily tapped,” he said.

“Still, the congressmans and senators contribution to the discussion of ways to increase savings is more than welcome. ACLI looks forward to working with them to provide retirement security to all Americans,” Keating said.

Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo., said, “These bills, by allowing individuals to accumulate tax-free interest and by streamlining current savings vehicles, represent an important step toward fundamental tax reform.”

Reproduced from National Underwriter Edition, March 10, 2005. Copyright 2005 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.