403(b) Plan

You may voluntarily defer some of your own income into the University 403(b) plan, up to the IRS limit of $23,000 if you are under age 50, or $30,500 if you are age 50 or older. You may enroll at any time.

There is also a Roth 403(b) contribution option available. With the Roth 403(b) contribution option, your contributions are deducted from your pay after income taxes are taken out, meaning that you do not receive an immediate tax break. As with traditional contributions, earnings grow tax deferred. Since you already paid tax on Roth contributions, you will not owe tax when you withdraw them. If your withdrawals of earnings are qualified (typically if it has been five years since your first Roth contribution and you are over the age of 59 1/2, those distributions are completely tax-free also.

Some advantages to investing in a 403(b) are as follows:

• reduces current income liability
• contributions and earnings grow tax-free
• if you think your tax liability is more now than it will be in the future or upon retirement, a pre-tax savings plan may be more advantageous

To access a 403(b) & 457(b) Comparison Chart, refer to the 403(b) or 457(b) section on the Benefit Summaries page of the website.

If you have questions, feel free to call the Benefits Department in the HR Service Center at 508-856-5260, option 1, option 1 for assistance.