Obama tells DOL to move forward with fiduciary redraft

President Barack Obama will speak Monday at AARP at 2 p.m. EST to officially say that he has given the Department of Labor the go ahead to move forward with the redraft of its rule to amend the definition of fiduciary under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.

Obama will say in his comments that he has directed DOL to move forward with its redraft “to protect families from bad retirement advice by requiring retirement advisers to abide by a ‘fiduciary’ standard — putting their clients’ best interest before their own profits,” according to a copy of his prepared remarks.

“Middle class economics means that Americans should be able to retire with dignity after a lifetime of hard work,” according to a copy of his remarks to be released by the White House. ”But today, the rules of the road do not ensure that financial advisers act in the best interest of their clients when they give retirement investment advice, and it’s hurting millions of working and middle class families.

“A system where Wall Street firms benefit from backdoor payments and hidden fees if they talk responsible Americans into buying bad retirement investments — with high costs and low returns — instead of recommending quality investments isn’t fair. These conflicts of interest are costing middle class families and individuals billions of dollars every year,” the White House press release states.

The White House will also release today its new report from the President’s Council of Economic Advisers showing that “the current, broken regulatory environment creates misaligned incentives that cost working and middle class families billions of dollars a year — with some individual families losing tens of thousands of dollars of their retirement savings.”