The portability election allows a surviving spouse to use any unused federal estate tax exemption from their deceased spouse’s estate, adding it to their own exemption. It is one of the most consequential and most frequently missed steps in estate administration — and its deadline is unforgiving. What It Is Each person has a federal estate tax exemption — the amount they can transfer at death free of federal estate tax.

A QTIP trust — Qualified Terminable Interest Property trust — is an estate planning vehicle that provides income to a surviving spouse during their lifetime while preserving the principal for beneficiaries of the deceased spouse’s choosing. It is the primary tool for balancing marital security against inheritance control in blended families and large estates. What It Is When one spouse dies, assets passing to the surviving spouse qualify for the unlimited marital deduction — no estate tax is owed on transfers between spouses at death.

When a marriage ends, retirement assets are often the largest financial stake on the table. And according to a March 2026 GAO report on spousal protections in retirement plans, the period surrounding a divorce is when a spouse is most exposed to losing retirement funds without any legal recourse — and least equipped to fight back. The Window of Vulnerability Because most 401(k) plans require no spousal consent to remove funds, a participant who anticipates divorce can — legally, under current federal law — liquidate a retirement account before the divorce is finalized and the assets are subject to division.

Extending spousal consent requirements to all defined contribution plans sounds straightforward on paper. If a spouse can veto a beneficiary change in most 401(k) plans, why can’t they veto a $50,000 withdrawal? The answer, according to a March 2026 GAO report, is a web of administrative, legal, and philosophical trade-offs that make the issue considerably more complex than it first appears. The Case for Expanding Requirements The current system is, as the GAO frames it, a historical accident.

The Thrift Savings Plan is the largest defined contribution plan in the United States, covering 7.2 million federal civilian employees and uniformed service members with $963 billion in assets as of December 2024. It is also one of the few defined contribution plans in the country that actually requires spousal consent before a participant can remove funds. A March 2026 GAO report examining spousal protections across the retirement system offers a detailed look at how the TSP’s consent framework works — including its notable gap on beneficiary designations.

The debate over spousal consent in 401(k) plans tends to overshadow a quieter but equally significant gap in the retirement protection system: Individual Retirement Accounts are entirely outside the federal spousal consent framework, and they’re bigger than the entire defined contribution plan market. According to figures cited in a March 2026 GAO report on spousal retirement protections, IRAs held $17 trillion in assets at the end of 2024, compared to $12 trillion across all defined contribution plans.

A new report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has confirmed what many divorce attorneys already know firsthand: the vast majority of defined contribution retirement plans — including the ubiquitous 401(k) — allow a married participant to take out loans, make withdrawals, and receive distributions without their spouse ever being informed, let alone asked. The report, GAO-26-107536, published in March 2026, was requested by members of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, and examined three core questions: when spousal consent is actually required, what happens to spouses when it isn’t obtained, and what the trade-offs of expanding consent requirements would be.

The retirement savings gap between men and women is well-documented. Women earn less over their lifetimes, are more likely to take career breaks for caregiving, and live longer — meaning they need more savings and tend to accumulate less. A March 2026 GAO report adds a less-discussed dimension to this picture: women are disproportionately exposed to the risk of a spouse quietly removing retirement funds without their knowledge or consent.