[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 4086 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

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117th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                S. 4086

To amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to better 
      enable plan sponsors to implement beneficial plan features.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                             April 26, 2022

Ms. Rosen (for herself and Mr. Scott of South Carolina) introduced the 
 following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on 
                 Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to better 
      enable plan sponsors to implement beneficial plan features.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Increasing Small Business Retirement 
Choices Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds as follows:
            (1) Retirement plan sponsors engage advisors to assist in 
        administering their retirement plans. Such advisors and other 
        service providers are paid via monthly or annual retainers to 
        advise on plan administration or the investment fund lineup. 
        Such retainers are charged to the retirement plan.
            (2) Other, incidental expenses incurred related to plan 
        design, may not be charged to the plan because they are deemed 
        settlor functions. For example, if a plan sponsor were to 
        inquire about a beneficial plan design feature, such as 
        automatic enrollment and reenrollment or automatic escalation, 
        the advisor or other service provider would bill the employer a 
        separate amount that could not be charged back to the plan. 
        Because these inquires result in additional costs, many 
        employers--especially small employers--choose to forego these 
        incidental plan design features, even when they might generate 
        tremendous benefits for their employees.
            (3) According to the 2021 Plan Sponsor Council of America's 
        Annual Survey of Profit Sharing and 401(k) Plans, only 30.5 
        percent of employers with fewer than 50 workers have an 
        automatic enrollment feature in their retirement plan, compared 
        to over 77 percent of employers with more than 1,000 workers. 
        Small employers need additional resources to improve their 
        retirement plan design.

SEC. 3. FACILITATING THE IMPLEMENTATION OF BENEFICIAL PLAN FEATURES.

    (a) Plan Assets.--Section 403(c)(1) of the Employee Retirement 
Income Security Act of 1974 (29 U.S.C. 1103(c)(1)) is amended by 
inserting ``(including incidental expenses solely for the benefit of 
the participants and their beneficiaries)'' before the period.
    (b) Fiduciary Standard of Care.--Section 404(a)(1)(A)(ii) of the 
Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (29 U.S.C. 
1104(a)(1)(A)(ii)) is amended by inserting ``(including incidental 
expenses solely for the benefit of the participants and their 
beneficiaries)'' before the semicolon.
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