Data and Research February 21, 2019

Participants Stay the Course With Their DC Plans

In the first three quarters of 2018, only 2.2% of participant stopped contributing to their plans, ICI data shows.

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Defined contribution (DC) plan participants remained committed to their plans in the first three quarters of 2018, data from the Investment Company Institute (ICI) shows.

A mere 2.2% of participants stopped contributing to their DC plans and only 2.9% took withdrawals, with the latter figure up only slightly from the 2.8% that took withdrawals in the first three quarters of 2017. Only 1.4% took hardship withdrawals in the first three quarters of 2018, up only slightly from the 1.3% that did so in the comparable time period in 2017.

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Participants also generally stayed the course with respect to their asset allocations, with only 8.4% changing the asset allocation of their account balances and 4.4% changing their contribution allocations. ICI says these figures were on par with the data from 2017.

In the first three quarters of 2018, 16.4% of plan participants had outstanding loans, down from 16.7% at year-end 2017.

ICI’s report, “Defined Contribution Plan Participants’ Activities, First Three Quarters of 2018,” also showed that 28% of U.S. retirement assets were in DC plans as of the end of the third quarter of 2018. ICI’s full report can be downloaded here.

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