PLANSPONSOR - September/October 2024 - 7

PARTICIPANT ANALYSIS
Hidden Below the 'Overall' Surface
PLAN sponsors may, with the help of their
recordkeeper and retirement plan adviser,
monitor their plan's progress toward
desired outcomes via plan analytics tools.
Since 1996, sponsors and industry professionals
have leaned into PLANSPONSOR's
Defined Contribution Survey and its related
benchmarking reports to learn about
design trends emerging within the broad
range of respondents' plans. Studying
these trends can lead plan committees to
improve their own plan's design.
Benchmarking can be complicated,
though, by the fact that overall averages
may hide industry-specific results. Take
the average participation rate for all plans,
of 76.6%. That might not be a good benchmark
for plans in the restaurant and food
service industry, where high employee
turnover potentially correlates with average
plan participation of 52.4%. Nor would it
be useful for law firms, where average
participation is 82.7%. If a food service
plan had 76% participation, it would be
outperforming peers, while a law firm
with the same would be underperforming.
Ultimately, an employer may want to
know how well its plan measures up against
peer plans-and industries' numbers can
vary widely. To provide more context, the
charts below list the top 10 industries for
participation rate and average deferral rate,
respectively, and the bottom 10 industries
for each. To see more detailed information,
contact surveys@issmediasolutions.com.
-Judy Faust Hartnett
Industry-Specific Data Make a Difference in Benchmarking a Plan
Participation Rate, by Industry
Average Deferral Rate, by Industry
1 Media/Comm/Publishing 90.8%
2 Architecture
90.3%
3 Research and development 88.4%
4 Pharmaceuticals and biotech 87.2%
5 Environmental: Recycling, etc. 86.3%
6 Banking: Comml, retail, other 85.5%
7 Consulting
8 Telecommunications
9 Chemicals and mining
10 Wholesale
38 Printing
85.5%
85.1%
84.6%
84.5%
71.4%
39 Transportation and airlines 70.2%
40 Advertising and marketing 68.8%
41 Agriculture
42 Education : K-12, etc.
43 Social services
68.6%
67.5%
64.8%
44 Gov/Pub wks: Cnty, state, fed 58.7%
45 Gov/Pub wks: City, muni
53.3%
46 Restaurants and food service 52.4%
47 Religious organizations
47.7%
Source: 2023 PLANSPONSOR Defined Contribution Survey
1 Gov/Pub wks: Cnty, state, fed 11.3%
2 Gov/Pub wks: City, muni
3 Pharmaceuticals and biotech
4 Consulting
5 Chemicals and mining
6 Utilities
7 Education: K-12, etc.
8 Membership organizations
9 Research and development
10 Manufacturing: Consumer
38 Hotels/Gaming/Ent
39 Social services
40 Banking: Comml, retail, other
41 Auto: Dealerships, service
42 Credit unions
43 Transportation and airlines
44 Building/Construction
45 Printing
46 Equipment: Sales
47 Advertising and marketing
8.9%
7.9%
6.7%
6.3%
6.2%
6.1%
6.1%
6.0%
5.9%
3.5%
3.5%
3.5%
3.4%
3.3%
3.2%
3.1%
2.9%
2.9%
1.6%
PLANSPONSOR.COM September - October 2024 7
BOTTOM 10
TOP 10
BOTTOM 10
TOP 10
http://www.PLANSPONSOR.COM
PLANSPONSOR - September/October 2024

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