Reflecting on 20 years of the Pension Protection Act. Looking ahead to the next 20.

Success has a way of changing the question

Twenty years ago, the Pension Protection Act of 2006 (PPA) changed the trajectory of workplace retirement. Automatic enrollment, professionally managed investing, and thoughtful plan design fundamentally reshaped how millions of people save for the future.

Today, the industry faces a different challenge

Getting people into workplace retirement plans was never the finish line. It was the starting point. People are living longer. Careers are less linear. Financial priorities have multiplied. AI is changing how guidance is delivered. And millions of workers still lack access to the workplace retirement system altogether.

So where should the retirement industry focus next?

To answer that question, Empower interviewed five of the industry's most respected voices across retirement policy, practice, research, and innovation. While each brought a different perspective, a remarkable consensus emerged. Five themes are poised to shape the next 20 years of retirement innovation:

The result is not a retrospective on the Pension Protection Act. It's a forward-looking conversation about what the last 20 years made possible and what the retirement industry should build next.

Read the full paper to explore where workplace retirement goes from here