Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger threw his political heft Tuesday behind a new proposal to open the California Public Employees' Retirement System to private sector businesses and workers to encourage Californians to save more for retirement.

"Having a financially secure retirement is part of the American Dream and this bill will help that dream come true for millions of hardworking Californians and their families," Schwarzenegger said in a prepared statement.

The proposal to open CalPERS to the private sector is contained in Assembly Bill 2940 by Assemblyman Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles.

AB 2940 would allow Californians whose employers don't offer retirement savings plans to put money into the California Employee Savings Program.

Employers without retirement plans could also participate.

The retirement plan, unlike 401(k) plans, could be taken by the worker from job to job. If the plan is approved by the Internal Revenue Service, CalPERS would administer it with fees paid by the account holders, at no expense to taxpayers.

Several other states have considered similar programs. But de León's office said California would be the first to put one in place.

"AB 2940 will make California the first state in the nation to offer secure and portable individual savings accounts to working people," de León said at a press conference Tuesday.

De León ran through a litany of statistics to show how little workers put toward retirement, leaving them to subsist on Social Security payments. About 6 million California workers, 43 percent, work at jobs that don't offer retirement savings plans such as 401(k)s or traditional pensions that guarantee an income in retirement.

Without enough income, retirees rely more on government services, de León said.

"If we don't help Californians save now, we the state will pay later," he said.

In the original bill, only low- and moderate-income workers would have been eligible to participate. But de León said Tuesday that the bill is being revised to eliminate income requirements.

Workers now can put money into savings accounts such as IRAs, even if their employers don't offer 401(k)s.

But de León said that the Cal-PERS accounts would offer attractions not found in the commercial market. Fees would be lower, he said, and CalPERS has a long track record of stellar investment returns.

The program would allow workers to have money deducted from their paychecks automatically, making it more likely that they would participate. De León said one challenge would be to get workers never involved in financial markets to sign up.

"This is about behavior modification, too," he said.

Small business groups appeared with de León to support the bill.

"A lot of small businesses do not have the resources to do this," said Scott Hauge, president of Small Business California. "This makes us more competitive."

The bill is being sponsored by the New America Foundation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan policy group.

CalPERS spokesman Brad Pacheco said the retirement system learned about the bill just recently and is analyzing it. The CalPERS board normally votes to support or oppose legislation affecting the retirement system.

The union that represents the single largest contingent of state workers said it was taking a "wait-and-see attitude."

"We support the goals of the legislation," said Jim Zamora, spokesman for Service Employees International Union Local 1000, which represents 92,500 state workers. "But we're not sure how all this will play out in terms of how it will affect CalPERs and restructuring of CalPERs.

"We're very happy with CalPERs as far as it being a safe, reliable investment vehicle for pensions. We don't want to see any legislation passed that would weaken that."

The bill is scheduled for its first hearing today in the Assembly Committee on Public Employees, Retirement and Social Security.