Most workers who aren’t saving for retirement through their employers aren’t saving at all, the study found
New data suggests the average American worker has under $1,000 saved for retirement.
A report from the National Institute on Retirement Security found that the median savings for all employed adults between the ages of 21 and 64 were approximately $955. The study includes workers with 401(k) and other retirement savings plans, as well as the approximately 56 million workers who do not have access to employer-sponsored retirement plans.
Workers with retirement savings plans have a median balance of approximately $40,000 saved, according to the report. That figure is nowhere near the $1.5 million that Americans say they need to feel comfortable fully retiring.
How and why would you save as someone in the US? This country is collapsing.
You can invest in international markets if you think the US market is doomed. Still not a reason not to save. The bigger problem is that so many people simply can’t afford living expenses AND saving for retirement.
With what money?
See the second half of my comment.
$955 of investments is better than $0 of investments.
No, not in any meaningful way given how rigged and broken the economy is for the average person.
$955 can buy a gun (and ammo).
In order to retire, 500k is sort of the minimum. Even with conservative spending, you’d have to be a millionaire. If you’re young, multi - millionaire has to be the target for retirement. $955 is literally a rounding error on that scale. The average 64 year old retiree probably sees their investments fluctuate by several thousand every day.
Well you see, dr oz has an answer for that. Just start working earlier, and dont retire. No need to save
Life is a Crudite and we are merely sliced vegetables to be browsed over distractedly by the ultrawealthy.
Even though i’m not an a american I thought it’s a very negative thing to say and considered to argue. I found I have no augment to offer.
Your money/investments/wealth isn’t necessarily limited to just the US. Someone could take their assets and move to a different country and put those assets towards retirement.
The idea that you can’t save because it’s collapsing is just doubling down on sinking with the ship.
What a stupid, dismissive thing to say.
If you can save and get out, good for you.
The vast majority in the US cannot save and I genuinely think trying to is futile, collapse is roaring towards us and given the acceleration of climate change over the last 10 years there isn’t even enough quality lifespan left for many to make saving a rational pursuit in the first place given the extreme poverty trap that the US functions as.
If we have no agency over our lives ending prematurely, the idea of us all transcending this fate through individualized saving is worse than useless.
Your orginal comment asks
implying it isn’t worth it to save anything if you live there.
In the US economically the rich here will not allow the poor to have the breathing room to save, they can’t or else the system of extraction here loses its essential domineering grip.
I would rather flee the country with $955 to my name than with nothing. I’m not saying its easy or a fair system but not even attempting to save because of how fucked things are is just a terrible strategy.
I don’t think you understand the crushing reality of living in poverty in the US. Over 60% of the US lives paycheck to paycheck. That should make it clear that it’s a systemic issue. Some people live above their means by choice, or lack of thoughtful planning. Many people live above their means because the means they have access to don’t cover the cheapest of basics, so we go without. I lived off of one meal a day, all through my 20’s, because that’s what I could afford. Ignorant people lectured me on the importance of saving that whole time. We don’t have a problem understanding the importance of saving. You have a problem understanding the class system in the US.
Past a certain point believing you can beat a horrendously rigged game designed to be as cruel as possible just blinds you to a starker reality, it is neither helpful for inducing positive systematic reform nor helpful for understanding yourself and your piled up failures in a loving light.
I don’t know why this person thinks you can leave the States for a grand. Thank you for trying to explain…
Invest everything you can into highly diversified, low-cost index funds and continue doing that for multiple decades. That’s the how.
The why should be pretty obvious.
Why wouldn’t someone save in the US?
The country is burning down? Sure. We don’t know what things will look like in a year? Me neither!
But I’d rather save and invest because in 40 years things may or may not have turned out fine. And I’d have a couple million and you will have zero because “why would you save!?!?” mentality.
If you get started early enough, you don’t even have to save a lot over time or even month to month. But if you wait until the last second(40s, 50s?) you’ll need to be dumping thousands per month just to catch up.
This is a math problem, not an emotional one.
Because that commenter is an upvote seeking doomer troll. It’s like they have some sort of contradiction fetish.
If you think we have 40 years before general collapse you are in for an enormous amount of unprocessed heartbreak.
https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/sst_daily/
Ah, you’re right. I’m going to go sell everything I have then go to Mexico and buy as much hookers and blow that I can and then commit suicide because everything is going to shit and nothing even matters anymore! There is no future! REEEEEEEEE!
/s
Garbage doomer comment. I await all your upvotes.
I am sorry I triggered you.