Trump Accounts could deepen the wealth divide | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

Two babies born at the same hospital on the same day will each get a $1,000 Treasury deposit into a Trump Account on July 4. One child’s parents will add $5,000 every year for 18 years, while the other family will never contribute beyond the initial deposit.

By the time both children reach adulthood, one account could hold roughly $271,000, and the other would sit at approximately $6,000.

Those projections come directly from the Trump Accounts website and are based on historical S&P 500 average returns over 18 years.

The difference comes down to contribution rules that reward families who already have savings to spare, not the program’s existence itself.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed that as of late May 2026, nearly 6 million children had been signed up for 530A Accounts.

The critical question now is whether the accounts are serving families that can afford additional contributions or those who most need the seed money.

How 530A contribution rules favor families with existing wealth

Trump Accounts, formally designated as Section 530A accounts under the Internal Revenue Code, were created through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act in 2025, according to the Internal Revenue Service.

Every U.S. child under 18 with a Social Security number is eligible, and babies born between 2025 and 2028 receive a $1,000 deposit from the Treasury.

After the initial deposit, parents and other contributors can add up to $5,000 annually, with up to $2,500 of that coming from an employer, the IRS reported.

That annual cap is the mechanism that transforms the program from a universal savings tool into one that disproportionately benefits higher-income households.

Families who max out contributions every year unlock the full force of compounding inside a tax-deferred vehicle designed to grow for nearly two decades.

Families struggling to cover basic expenses may never contribute beyond the initial federal deposit, leaving their children with a fraction of the growth.

“A wealthy family could build a $150,000 nest egg by the time their child turns 30,” Connecticut State Treasurer Erick Russell said in a July 2025 statement contrasting the federal program with Connecticut’s Baby Bonds initiative.

Trump Account enrollment barriers could exclude families who need program most

The program’s structural concerns extend beyond contribution levels, reaching into how families gain access to accounts in the first place.

Registering for a Trump Account requires either filing IRS Form 4547 with a 2025 tax return or completing the registration through TrumpAccounts.gov, followed by an account activation step.

That two-step process creates a barrier for families who do not file tax returns because their income falls below the filing threshold.

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The Urban Institute’s modeling puts concrete numbers behind those concerns, breaking down enrollment gaps by income level and race.

Under the opt-in system, roughly 7% of children in the bottom income quintile would miss the program entirely, the simulation found.

That figure compares with only 1% of children in the top two income quintiles, a gap largely driven by administrative barriers.

Racial disparities appear as well, with roughly 4% of Black households and 3% of Hispanic households expected to miss enrollment, versus 2% of white households.

Enrollment rules that require tax filings or multi-step registration risk leaving lower-income and minority families underrepresented in the program.

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Policy experts say automatic enrollment is the only fix

Researchers have converged on a single recommendation to close the participation gap: shifting the program from opt-in to automatic enrollment for all eligible children.

“In any of these programs, you are looking for a frictionless experience, and anything that creates friction will reduce engagement in the program,” said Madeline Brown, a senior policy associate at the Urban Institute.

Nina Olson, executive director of the Center for Taxpayer Rights, urged automatic enrollment in a January 2026 letter to the Treasury Department.

Olson wrote that if social program administrators “have learned anything in recent decades, it is the importance of automatic enrollment,” according to the Center for Taxpayer Rights letter sent to Scott Bessent in January 2026.

George Warren Brown Distinguished University Professor Michael Sherraden shared a similar take with the Washington University Newsroom.

Automatic enrollment is the difference between Trump Accounts functioning as a truly universal wealth-building policy and a policy that unintentionally leaves out many children.

The recommendation draws on evidence from workplace retirement plans, where automatic enrollment consistently lifts participation rates across income levels and demographic groups.

Families in the bottom income quintile would collectively miss nearly $600 million in federal contributions under the current system, the Urban Institute estimated.

Philanthropy and employer matches fill gaps without fixing the structural problem

Private donors and large corporate employers have stepped in to supplement the federal deposit for families who fall outside the program’s reach.

Michael and Susan Dell pledged $6.25 billion to provide $250 deposits for roughly 25 million children age 10 and under, born before 2025 and therefore ineligible for the federal $1,000 deposit, in ZIP codes where the median income is $150,000 or less, CNBC reported.

Large employers, including JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, have also committed to matching the $1,000 Treasury deposit for employees’ children who open accounts, Bloomberg reported.

Those commitments add meaningful dollars, but employer matching programs tend to flow to workers at large financial firms who already earn higher salaries.

“Those are higher income earners, so it’s not clear to me how likely that is to help wealth building writ large,” Brown said.

Design choices ahead will determine whether 530A accounts deliver on promise

Brad Gerstner, CEO of Altimeter Capital and a lead architect of the initiative, has framed the program’s mission as broadening economic participation.

Every dollar will be invested in a low-cost, broad U.S. equity index fund. Gerstner has framed this as making enrolled children “direct shareholders” in “the best 500 companies in America,” he told CNBC. “We’re going to get all the people who have felt left out and left behind,” Gerstner said.

Roughly 73 million children across 44 million American families are eligible for 530A accounts, according to the Treasury’s March 2026 proposed regulations.

Whether the program narrows or widens the wealth gap hinges on the enrollment and contribution design choices that policymakers finalize in the coming months.