Reply #77: loyalsister, most Americans do not earn enough during their

[JDPriestly]

working years even when they work full-time for most of those years, to save for a meaningful pension. Today, most people who have pensions work or worked for the government. So, people have to save their own retirement money. The problem is that right now jobs are hard to get so a lot of baby boomers are living on the money they saved for retirement. Also, wages adjusted for inflation have been stagnant since the 1980s at least if not before.

Also, a person aged 65 may think he has saved enough to retire. And if he dies at 75 or so, he may be right. But we never know how long we will live. If you retire at 67 and live to the age of 98, you could easily run out of money even if you saved diligently.

And when you do run out of money, the government will have to take care of you. Social Security and Medicare are cheap and relatively easy to administer because they cover you without a lot of ifs ands and buts. Ironically, trying to save money can add to the administrative costs for a program.

. . . .
The typical pre-retiree household (age 55 and up) has a retirement savings of $60,000.

. . . .


According to a survey, 51 percent of workers age 55 and up have saved less than $50,000 in retirement savings (not including the value of a primary residence). And 39 percent of workers in the same age group have saved less than $25,000 in retirement savings.

Another survey estimates that one in five pre-retirees age 50 to 64 has less than $5,000 in retirement savings.

http://www.zero2rich.com/average-retirement-savings.html