You can read this weekly compilation every Monday in FiduciaryNews.com under the "Trending Topics" category. Since I can't devote an entire article about every trending topic, this regular feature allows me to share a few quick (usually snarky) thoughts on the topic de jour.

The best ideas that ooze up by connecting the dots of those weekly trending topics make it on my editorial calendar. But, I've never quite figured out what to do with the ideas that fall far short of serious discussion. Until now …

Every year presents its share of really bad ideas when it comes to helping Americans save for retirement, but one must take the prize as the top turkey. By coincidence this week's Trending Topics (see, "FiduciaryNews Trending Topics for ERISA Plan Sponsors: Week Ending 11/21/14," FiduciaryNews.com, November 24, 2014) offers a couple of stories that perfectly describes the 2015 Retirement Plan Turkey Award.

As you might expect, this year's Turkey Award belongs to the Washington, D.C., intelligentsia. Now, we didn't have the opportunity to name previous years' Turkey Award, but it makes sense that, somewhere along the way, the idea that retirement savings tax incentives "cost" the government.

Never mind that this year's tax breaks for retirement contributions pale in comparison to the massive income tax receipts that come during the withdrawal years. Only can a government bean counter not know how to calculate the time value of money (or the importance of calculating net present value).

The 2015 Turkey Award goes to a similar misfire. As outlined in this week's FiduciaryNews.com Trending Topics, it appears the Government Accountability Office wants the IRS to "bolster enforcement" on multi-million dollar (a.k.a. "Romney-sized") IRAs.

While the GAO doesn't go so far to say the owners of those accounts violated the law, it implies they had an unfair advantage by "investing in assets unavailable to most investors." 

In attacking the 43 million Americans with IRA assets in excess of $5 million, the GAO apparently failed to read between the lines in the earlier unsuccessful attack on Romney-sized IRAs.

That previous attempt to stir up class warfare resulted in the opposite effect. Rather than vilifying those large IRA holders, the more common question was, "How do I do that?"

But that's not why the GAO gets the 2015 Retirement Plan Turkey Award. No, it gets it because of the example it brings up and the ironic results of the logical "fix" to that example.

First, recall the GAO's main premise being the IRS loses tax revenues since contributions to IRAs are not taxed. In the most egregious example it can name, the GAO cites IRA owners who donate very low-value privately held stock that then skyrockets once the company becomes successful.

Now, this can easily be resolved by simply eliminating the possibility of investing IRA assets in such "alternative" investments. (Yes, I know this would mean swimming upstream in terms of current investment fads, but just follow me on this one.). 

So, here's what happens from a tax revenue standpoint should Congress prohibit investing IRA assets in anything but exchange listed securities.

First, those "low value privately held stocks" that appreciate one-thousand-fold would not be taxed at the capital gains tax rate instead of being allowed to grow tax free in an IRA (assuming the owner has no capital losses to offset those gains).

Hmm, sounds like the GAO might be on to something. Of course, there are repercussions. Those IRA assets that once grew one-thousand-fold now grow only ten-fold.

This means for every $100 the IRS would have reaped from the original Romney-sized IRA would be reduced to one dollar from the non-Romney-sized IRA. Oops!

Unfortunately, it gets worse for the IRS (and for the GAO's logic).

Remember that "new-found" capital gains tax? Well, it actually represents a break for the owner. You see, if those capital gains had been allowed to accumulate "tax free" in the Romney-sized IRA, they would have been taxed at the much higher income tax rate (if not the even much much higher estate tax rate).

By effecting this change (outlawing alternative investments), the IRS would see future revenues cut (at least) in half; hence, defeating the original intent of the GAO's complaint about large IRAs. 

And that's why the GAO is the (hopefully-not-so)-proud winner of the 2015 Retirement Plan Turkey Award.