1980s SURPRISED AMAZED BUG-EYED BLONDE WOMAN LOOKING AT PILE OF CASH MONEY (Photo by H. Armstrong Roberts/ClassicStock/Getty Images)
H. Armstrong Roberts/ClassicStock
Starting in January, the federal government will begin depositing money directly into eligible workers’ retirement accounts — a first in U.S. policy. But millions of lower‑income women are poised to miss the new Saver’s Match entirely because they don’t have an account for the funds to land in.
The Saver’s Match came out of the retirement law Congress passed in 2022, and it finally goes live next year. The idea is plain. You contribute to a retirement account. If your income qualifies, the government matches you, up to $1,000 a year.
Now ask yourself a question. If a job offered you a dollar-for-dollar match on your 401(k), would you walk past it? A match is the closest thing to free money that exists in personal finance. Everyone in my world tells you to grab every dollar of it.
So why am I worried that the women who need this most will never see a cent?
Why Millions Could Miss Out
To benefit from the match, you need a retirement account to catch it in. And millions of people, disproportionately women, do not have one. If your employer does not offer a 401(k), and plenty of the jobs women hold do not, you have nothing for the government to match into. An estimated 26 million eligible workers are in exactly that spot right now. No account. No match. The gift arrives and there is no mailbox to receive it.
This is the part that makes me want to grab women by the shoulders. The match is aimed at lower earners, the people it could help the most. Women are overrepresented in part-time work, in caregiving years spent off the clock, in the gig jobs that come with zero benefits. The design of this program almost guarantees that the people it was built to help are the people least likely to be positioned for it. You do not get a second shot at a year of free money. Miss it, and that thousand dollars is gone.
What You Need To Do Before January
Here is what I want you to do, and I want you to do it before January, not after.
Open An Account
First, open an account. If your job offers a retirement plan, enroll and set even a small contribution. If it does not, open your own IRA. The government is setting up a portal to make this easier for people without a workplace plan, with low-fee options and no minimum balance, so not having one is no longer an excuse.
Check Your Eligibility
Second, confirm you qualify. This is built for lower and middle earners, and it phases out as you make more. If you file single, you get the full match at roughly $20,500 of earnings, and it disappears by about $35,500. Head of household runs about $30,750 to $53,250. Married filing jointly runs about $41,000 to $71,000. Earn above the top of your range and you get nothing, so look up your number. Do not assume you make too much, and do not assume you make too little.
Contribute Enough To Capture The Full Match
Third, contribute enough to capture the full match. Here is the part people get wrong. The match is 50 cents on the dollar, up to the first $2,000 you deposit. So to pull the full $1,000, you have to contribute $2,000 of your own money, not $1,000. That is not spending. That is turning two dollars into three.
Claim What’s Yours
I built my whole platform on one idea. Waiting for someone to rescue your finances is how women stay stuck. Nobody is coming. But once in a great while the system actually leaves money on the table for you, and the only real harm is refusing to walk over and pick it up.
This is one of those times. Set the reminder. Open the account. Claim what is yours.
