Thousands of businesses have officially signed up for the MyCTSavings retirement program. According to the State Comptroller’s Office, assigned with administering the program, around 3,400 small businesses in the state signed up by the March 30th deadline.
That number is ahead of the comptroller’s initial goals. Even so, thousands more businesses are likely required to register with the program that have not yet done so. More than 18,000 businesses hadn’t registered as of the end of February.
The comptroller’s office has not released an updated number of unregistered businesses but the deadline to register for the program has been extended to the end of August.
MyCTSavings allows employees of small businesses without a retirement program to deposit money automatically into a Roth IRA through paycheck withholdings. Businesses with at least five employees are required to sign up for the program, though employees can opt-out. Employers do not pay into it.
Small businesses that do have a retirement program in place are exempt.
Proponents of the program see it as a way to help residents save for their future, supplement social security payments later in life, and lower the number of people relying on social programs.
The 3,400 businesses currently enrolled account for more than 10,000 individual employees with $3.5 million in assets. That is equal to about $350 per employee.