Summer heat held in August — not only for California, but also for its state-run retirement plan. The CalSavers Retirement Savings Board, which administers CalSavers, reports that by many measures strong growth remains consistent.
Some of the growth reflects the June 30, 2022 deadline for employers with five or more employees in the Golden State to register with CalSavers, and the results for the first two months after that deadline.
CalSavers, formally launched on July 1, 2019, has required employers to either begin offering a retirement plan if they had not done so or register with the program, in waves based on the size of their workforce. Employers with more than 100 employees were to do so by Sept. 30, 2020; those with 50 or more employees had until June 30, 2021.
Registrations jumped sharply between May 31 and June 30. Subsequent rates in other areas continued to show robust increases throughout the summer, reflecting the new activity by the suddenly higher number of employers that registered in June—such as employers that started payroll deductions, payroll contributing accounts and total assets. Similarly, withdrawals and opt-out rates also have been growing at a stronger rate.
The one outlier has been average account balance, which rose sharply from June to July but in August fell back to June levels.
More specifically, CalSavers grew by the following measures:
Measure | As of Aug. 31, 2022 | As of July 31, 2022 | As of June 30, 2022 | As of May 31, 2022 |
Employers registered | 106,959 | 103,994 | 98,417 | 56,556 |
Payroll contributing accounts | 362,331 | 325,422 | 301,124 | 285,275 |
Total assets | $270,576,561 | $256,256,844 | $223,049,153 | $221,629,703 |
Average funded account balance | $807 | $854 | $806 | $845 |
Withdrawals
Participants may make withdrawals from their accounts as well. The amount withdrawn and the number of account holders who made withdrawals grew sharply.
Measure | As of Aug. 31, 2022 | As of July 31, 2022 | As of June 30, 2022 | As of May 31, 2022 |
Withdrawals | $49,314,057 | $44,795,475 | $40,893,704 | $36,899,929 |
Accounts with a partial withdrawal | 10,548 | 4,548 | 4,153 | 3,784 |
Accounts with a full withdrawal | 63,004 | 47,256 | 44,540 | 42,066 |
Opt-Outs
Participants may opt out of CalSavers. The percentage of participants opting out in August was almost the same as that in July, but is more than 4 percentage points higher than that of May.
As of Aug. 31, 2022 | As of July 31, 2022 | As of June 30, 2022 | As of May 31, 2022 |
37.54% | 37.56% | 36.64% | 33.34% |
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