Things I Tell My Wife by Matt Knutson

“I’m not sure if we’ve ever had a more adult week than this one,” I told my wife as I reflected on our current life stage. We’re both nearly 26 years old and have managed to secure decent paying jobs in the fields we studied in college and are well on the path of being responsible adults, but this week feels a little more grown up than normal.

Sera set up her retirement plan, we met with our Realtor about purchasing a home, and we’ll be revisiting our insurance policies this weekend. Also on the to-do list is setting up an appointment to file our taxes. Truthfully, we didn’t even plan to have all of this happen at the same time. It could definitely be overwhelming, but I’m a little excited about it all. Unfortunately it doesn’t mean it will all be easy.

When Sera began her new position in January, we knew she’d be setting up her retirement plan soon. After filing the normal paperwork and meeting with an advisor, things seemed good to go. Last week she received a copy of the final paperwork and noticed the financial consultant had incorrectly marked that she was a U.S. citizen. After many months of going through the immigration process, this is something we’re highly sensitive to and work hard to prevent. One wrong box checked on a form can later result to accusations of fraud and potentially create a big barrier on her path to citizenship. While that scenario is unlikely, we’d rather not risk it.

The fun continued when she was notified that changing her status from being a U.S. citizen on the form was uncharted territory for her representative. As he called up the chain and connected with the national office (this is a well-known, nation wide company), it became clear that no other non-U.S. citizen had ever attempted to start a retirement account with them. My wife was once again blazing a trail we had assumed would have been well worn down by previous immigrants. Thankfully this was an easy one and the retirement plan was established quite easily.

The thought of my wife being the first non-U.S. citizen attempting to set up a retirement account with a Fortune 500 company was startling to me. In 2012, the Center for American Progress identified 22.1 million noncitizens were in America. About 13 million of those were unauthorized migrants or here on temporary visas, so it makes logical sense that they wouldn’t be taking out retirement accounts. Out of the 9 million who are here on an authorized, non-temporary visa, my wife is the first to set up a retirement account at this particular, nationwide institution. What does this say about this unique subset of people?

To me it meant there’s a gap in financial stability education for our immigrant workers. I was ready to write a rousing column this week stating we needed to educate this population on financial planning and how to be prepared for the years to come. Then I did a little more research and discovered something even scarier.

A CBS story from October 2014 cited information from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, saying, “Just 53 percent of American workers participate in any type of retirement plan at work.” The immigrant population wasn’t the only group not saving for retirement, and it was foolish of me to think our country’s lack of financial planning was limited to one group.

Thankfully there are tools available online to teach budgeting, taxes and retirement plans for free. Khan Academy is one that I’ve personally visited several times when I need a refresher. Certainly there are hurdles many people need to get over before they can even consider saving for retirement, but we’re lucky to live in a time where this information is available online if you can find where to look.

Pending we win the lottery (this week wasn’t our lucky week), Sera and I are a long way off from retirement. It may seem very grown-up of us to be planning ahead for that time, but it’s also very comforting that something should be there when we start getting closer to retirement age. By that point I hope I’ll be writing a column in 2055 about how youthful Sera and I felt that week as we enjoyed a vacation down south on the warm beach.

 

Rochester resident Matt Knutson is the communications and events director for United Way of Olmsted County.