President Donald Trump just finished introducing huge new investment accounts for America’s children.
Now he wants to do the same thing for their parents and grandparents.
Speaking at a Rose Garden lunch Monday, Trump announced his administration is studying Australia’s national retirement savings model — called “superannuation” — and is considering building a similar mandatory employer contribution system for American workers.
“I made reference today that Australia has a thing going that’s very good — it’s really worked out very well,” Trump said. “We’re looking at that very strongly. We’re going to be taking that, and we’re going to be maybe making it a little bit sharper, a little bit even better. But we’re going to be doing that.”
He called the program a companion to the children’s Trump Accounts, which officially launched July 4.
“That would be more for grown-ups, as opposed to children,” Trump explained. “It’s something that’s going to be great, I think, if we can get it done.”
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick are already working on the proposal, Trump said. Congressional approval would be required to implement it.
Australia’s superannuation system works like this: employers are legally required to contribute at least 12% of every worker’s ordinary earnings directly into a private, tax-favored retirement account — on top of their full salary, not deducted from it. The accounts are managed by private funds, not the government.
Australia’s system is consistently ranked among the best retirement programs in the world, and the country has seen dramatic reductions in elderly poverty since it launched in 1992.
The Trump version, the president said, would take Australia’s model and make it “sharper.”
The announcement came just three days after Trump simultaneously rang the opening bells of both the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq — the first joint bell ringing in history — to mark the launch of Trump Accounts for children. Under the program created by last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, every American child born between January 2025 and December 2028 receives a $1,000 seed investment from the U.S. Treasury into a private investment account. Families, employers, and friends can contribute an additional $5,000 per year. Six million accounts have already been opened.
Treasury Secretary Bessent called the children’s program “the most important benefit for young people since the G.I. Bill.” He said the adult version would follow the same philosophy.
“Trump Accounts represent the triumph of capitalism over socialism,” Bessent said. “Through Trump Accounts, our president is creating an ownership economy where all citizens become shareholders in America’s wealth.”
White House estimates project a child born in 2026 could accumulate $5,800 in their account by age 18 with no contributions beyond the government seed. With maximum annual contributions from parents and employers, that figure could climb to $303,800.
Trump tied the entire initiative to his broader fight against what he called a rising communist threat in American life.
“It’s going to teach children to be entrepreneurial as opposed to the threat of communism that you’re seeing,” Trump said. “This is not social Democrats, by the way. They’re not social Democrats. They’re communists. They want to destroy our country — we’re not going to let that happen.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), a longtime proponent of private investment accounts, was present at Monday’s Rose Garden event. He has previously argued that programs like Trump Accounts could offer a long-term pathway toward partially privatizing Social Security, which the Congressional Budget Office has warned faces insolvency within the next decade. The White House declined to confirm whether the adult superannuation proposal is intended as a Social Security reform vehicle.
Democrats are, naturally, furious.
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS) told his constituents Monday to “pass on a Trump Account,” calling the program a scam.
The White House rapid response team was gleeful. “Nothing says ‘I care about my voters like telling them to give their child a financial disadvantage,” they posted on social media.