![]() Less than a quarter of small businesses currently offer their employees a 401 (k) plan, according to a new survey, with a sizable segment of those owners indicating that they may never have such employee benefits, owing to cost concerns. The survey was conducted by the Arlington-based firm Wakefield Research and also revealed that some 55% of responding small businesses with staff levels of anywhere from one to fifty felt that their companies were too small to actually access a plan. A smaller 28% said they did not think they would be able to afford a company match. The survey’s findings align with a different survey conducted last year by the company Fidelity Investment which showed that 48% of small business owners said they didn’t think they could afford to offer such plans to their employees. 401 (k) plans have been up and running since 1978. As defined by the Internal Revenue Code, such plans are employer-sponsored and serve as personal pension or savings accounts with both employees and employers contributing to the plan’s fund. Such plans have proven to be mainstays among larger businesses and corporations, with the most recent figures revealing that total 401 (k) plan assets in the U.S. are in excess of $4.6 trillion. The Wakefield survey also showed that business owners in general are saving less than 1% of their current income for retirement, with a larger 17% saving anywhere between 1 and 9%. A sizable 25% of the respondents said they were not contributing one way or the other to a retirement plan. Nearly 50% of the business owner respondents, indicating a precarious economic state of affairs, said they doubted they would ever have enough savings to retire. The survey was commissioned by the group ShareBuilder 401k of Seattle, which provides retirement products and resources to small and mid-sized companies. By Garry Boulard
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