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Bio: J. Mark Iwry

J. Mark Iwry (pronounced “Eevry”) is Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury and is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Retirement and Health Policy at the U.S. Treasury Department. In these capacities, his portfolio includes pension, retirement, and savings policy, implementation of the Affordable Care Act, other health care, employee benefits, and compensation issues, and related policy, legislative, rulemaking, and regulatory responsibilities.

Mark has previously been a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Research Professor at Georgetown University, a partner in the law firm of Covington & Burling, Of Counsel to the law firm of Sullivan & Cromwell, the Treasury Department’s Benefits Tax Counsel, and a Principal of the nonpartisan Retirement Security Project.

Mark has often testified before Congress – representing Treasury and the Executive Branch or, while in the private sector, testifying as an independent expert — and State legislatures. He has provided policy advice to numerous Senators, Members of Congress and staff on both sides of the aisle and five Presidential campaigns. His books and articles include the co-edited volumes (with William Gale and Peter Orszag), Aging Gracefully: Ideas to Improve Retirement Security in America and Automatic: Changing the Way America Saves (with W. Gale, D. John, L. Walker).

In recent years he has been recognized as one of the “30 top financial players” (Smart Money magazine), “Investment News 20” (20 individuals expected to have a major influence on the financial services industry), “100 most influential people in finance” (Treasury and Risk), “50 most influential people in aging” (Next Avenue), 40 most influential people in pensions (Institutional Investor), number 3 among the “100 most influential people in 401(k)” (401(k) Wire), 25 most influential government officials affecting retirement plans (NAPA Net), etc. Among other awards, he has received the Retirement Income Industry Association award for innovation in retirement income products, the Government Partner Award of the American Payroll Association, an award for outstanding contributions to retirement security from the Pension Rights Center, and, for his previous service at Treasury, Treasury’s Exceptional Service Award “[i]n recognition of his outstanding leadership and accomplishments ….Widely respected as Treasury’s benefits and pension expert, Mr. Iwry excelled at building coalitions of diverse interests….”

A principal architect of the Saver’s Credit to expand 401(k) and IRA coverage of middle- and lower-income workers (claimed annually on some 8 million tax returns) and the “SIMPLE” IRA plan (covering an estimated 3 to 4 million workers), Mark also co-authored President Obama’s legislative proposal to achieve a breakthrough in coverage through automatic enrollment in IRAs, and played a central role in initiating and designing the nationwide state-based initiative to adopt the automatic IRA and other retirement savings programs through legislation at the state level. In the 1990s, he formulated and directed Treasury’s strategy to increase saving by defining, approving and promoting 401(k) automatic enrollment (and automatic rollover to curtail pension leakage). He also has been centrally involved in developing or orchestrating other expansions, simplifications, and improvements of the nation’s pension and benefits systems, law, and regulatory framework, including the payroll deduction IRA, the “myRA”, expansion of automatic 401(k) features, promoting lifetime income in retirement plans, IRS direct deposit of tax refunds into IRAs and US saving bonds, and the small business startup tax credit for new plans.

Mark is an honors graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, earned a Masters degree in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School, and is a member of the bar of the U.S. Supreme Court.