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Greater earners who maximize retirement financial savings now have extra time for pretax catch-up 401(okay) contributions, due to new IRS steerage.
At the moment, “catch-up contributions” permit savers 50 and older to funnel an additional $7,500 into 401(okay) plans and different retirement plans past the $22,500 worker deferral restrict for 2023.
A change enacted by way of Safe 2.0 would have eradicated the up-front tax break on catch-up contributions for greater earners by solely permitting these deposits in after-tax Roth accounts, beginning in 2024.
However the IRS on Friday introduced a two-year delay for the change, which means savers can nonetheless make pretax catch-up contributions by 2025, no matter revenue.
“The executive transition interval will assist taxpayers transition easily to the brand new Roth catch-up requirement,” the IRS mentioned in an announcement.
The Safe 2.0 change applies to workers making catch-up deposits to 401(okay), 403(b) or 457(b) plans who earned greater than $145,000 from a single firm the prior yr.
Some 16% of eligible workers took benefit of catch-up contributions in 2022, in keeping with a current Vanguard report primarily based on roughly 1,700 retirement plans.
Delay is ‘an excellent factor’ for retirement plans
The delay is “an excellent factor” for retirement plan directors, mentioned Dan Galli, a Norwell, Massachusetts-based licensed monetary planner and proprietor of Daniel J. Galli & Associates.
“There isn’t any means to do that proper with out a few years of preparation,” he added.
There isn’t any means to do that proper with out a few years of preparation.
Dan Galli
Proprietor of Daniel J. Galli & Associates
Roughly 200 organizations wrote a letter to Congress in July asking for extra time to implement the 401(okay) adjustments, and lots of are applauding the delay.
Retirement plan sponsors are grateful for the company’s “critically necessary aid,” Diann Howland, vp of legislative affairs for the American Advantages Council, mentioned in an announcement on Friday.
“With out this extra compliance interval, an unlimited variety of plans and employers wouldn’t have been in a position to adjust to the brand new requirement and certain would have needed to droop catch-up retirement contributions,” she mentioned.
‘Leverage the decrease tax brackets’
Whereas greater earners now have an additional two years for pre-tax catch-up 401(okay) contributions, some should take into account after-tax deposits with impending revenue tax regulation adjustments, Galli mentioned.
“This actually coincides effectively with the altering tax brackets coming in 2026,” he mentioned. A number of provisions from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, together with decrease particular person tax charges, will sundown after 2025 with out intervention from Congress.
Whereas pre-tax 401(okay) contributions present an upfront tax break, after-tax Roth deposits permit funds to develop and be withdrawn in retirement tax-free. And with potential tax hikes on the horizon, it could make sense for some traders to pay taxes now.
“What we’re doing with purchasers proper now could be attempting to leverage the decrease tax brackets for so long as we will,” Galli mentioned.
