You Have $1 Million in an IRA. At 73 the IRS Makes You Withdraw $37,736 Whether You Want It or Not. These 4 ETFs Make It Pay

Turning 73 changes the math on your IRA. The IRS stops asking politely and starts requiring you to take money out. On a $1 million traditional IRA balance at age 73, the Uniform Lifetime Table distribution period of 26.5 produces a required minimum distribution of roughly $37,736. You owe ordinary income tax on it, and you cannot skip it. The real question is how to build a portfolio that hands you that cash without forcing you to sell quality assets during a drawdown. Four ETFs do the heavy lifting: Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEARCA:VOO), JPMorgan Equity Premium Income ETF (NYSEARCA:JEPI), WisdomTree Floating Rate Treasury Fund (NYSEARCA:USFR), and Amplify CWP Enhanced Dividend Income ETF (NYSEARCA:DIVO).

RMD Math in Plain English

The core challenge is sequence risk run in reverse. The IRS picks the withdrawal date. Markets pick the price. If your $37,736 comes out during a drawdown, you lock in losses to satisfy a government rule, not because it makes any financial sense. The fix is to build a portfolio that already generates enough cash from dividends, covered-call premiums, and Treasury coupons to fund the RMD, so your principal keeps compounding. These four funds each cover one of the jobs the portfolio needs: growth, high income, cash preservation, and dividend growth with a tactical hedge.

VOO: The Growth Engine That Refills the Well

VOO tracks the S&P 500 and charges an expense ratio of 0.03%, meaning you keep $9,997 of every $10,000 working on your behalf. Over the past year, VOO has returned roughly 18.6%, and its YTD gain through late September 2026 stands at about 14%. Distributions are quarterly, with a trailing 12-month yield of approximately 1%. VOO serves as the portfolio’s growth engine, giving your IRA the runway to survive twenty or more years of forced withdrawals without being depleted by them.

JEPI: Monthly Cash Flow From Covered Calls

JEPI overlays covered calls on a portfolio of lower-volatility large caps. Top positions include Broadcom at 1.8%, Ross Stores at 1.7%, Amazon at 1.7%, and Apple at 1.7%. The fund charges 0.35% and pays monthly. Distributions are variable, with the trailing 12-month total coming in at approximately $4.58 per share and a forward yield near 8.1%. Twelve checks a year, staggered to arrive when quarterly funds go quiet, make it substantially easier to fund the RMD without touching principal.

USFR: The Cash Bucket That Actually Pays

USFR holds floating-rate Treasury notes, resetting its coupon weekly as short-term rates move. With the Federal Reserve raising the federal funds target range to 3.75%-4.00% in September 2026, its first hike in more than three years, USFR’s income is once again pointing upward rather than down. The fund distributes monthly, with an annual dividend rate near $1.89 per share and a distribution yield around 3.8%. The expense ratio is 0.15%. Price barely moves: USFR returned roughly 2.8% YTD and about 4% over one year. The strategy is straightforward: park next year’s RMD here. If equities fall in January, you draw from USFR instead of selling VOO into a declining market.

DIVO: Blue-Chip Dividend Growth With a Tactical Overlay

DIVO is actively managed by Capital Wealth Planning, blending roughly 25 to 30 blue-chip dividend growers with tactical covered calls written only when premiums justify the trade. It now runs $7.86 billion in net assets, having drawn more than $1.4 billion in new inflows in 2026 alone, at an expense ratio of 0.56%. Monthly distributions have climbed from $0.18264 in January 2026 to $0.19468 in August and $0.18904 in September 2026, reflecting a steady upward trend in per-share income. The fund returned 18.28% (NAV) over the year through August 31, 2026. DIVO gives you rising income and meaningful equity participation rather than JEPI’s higher but optically capped payout.

Trade-Offs You Should Know

JEPI’s covered-call overlay caps upside when the S&P surges higher, and the fund’s defensive stock sleeve leaves it trailing broad-market rallies in strong years. USFR’s income had been drifting lower through 2025 as the Fed cut rates three times, but the September 2026 hike reversed that trend, and with another quarter-point increase projected before year end, the floating-rate coupon is rising again. DIVO’s 0.56% fee is real money on a seven-figure balance, though its track record of dividend growth partially offsets the drag. And every dollar you pull from a traditional IRA is taxed as ordinary income, no matter which of these four funds it came from (the tax bill that hits the year RMDs begin is exactly the problem we walked through defusing years earlier in a free guide here).

The goal is to meet the IRS on your own terms. Growth from VOO, monthly income from JEPI and DIVO, and a stable cash sleeve in USFR let you fund $37,736 a year without ever being a forced seller. That is what makes the withdrawal pay.

Editor’s note: This article updates several figures to reflect current data. VOO’s one-year return has been revised from 20.6% to approximately 18.6%, USFR’s annual dividend rate has been updated from $1.72851 to approximately $1.89 per share, DIVO’s net assets have been raised from $5.24 billion to $7.86 billion, and the federal funds rate discussion has been corrected to reflect the Fed’s September 2026 rate increase to a 3.75%-4.00% target range, reversing the article’s earlier claim that rates had fallen year-over-year.

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