President Obama introduced the nation to his new MyRA program at his State of the Union address last month, opening the door for Americans with only modest amounts to save to start putting money away for retirement. But did the president pass up what could have been an even better choice for retirement savings?
In the following video, Dan Caplinger, The Motley Fool's director of investment planning, looks back at history at an alternative proposal from a decade ago that might have addressed the needs to retirement savers better. Dan discusses how the combination of Lifetime Savings Accounts and Retirement Savings Accounts proposed in 2004 would have addressed a key problem with the MyRA: the lack of investment choices. Dan notes that those proposals included more flexible investment options that include stocks, and that the MyRA would be a better program if it mimicked other options in the Thrift Savings Plan other than just government bonds. Given the prevalence of stock market ETFs such as iShares S&P 500 (IVV 0.56%) and Vanguard Total Stock (VTI 0.15%), getting stock exposure shouldn't have been hard -- and the lack of it could lead many to become disillusioned with how little their money grows in their MyRAs.
