Are You Well-Prepared For Retirement?
b'With Diane Oakley, Executive Director, National Institute on Retirement Security
While most Americans don\\u2019t save as much as they should, is the retirement savings crisis worse than we think? Of 38 million working age households, fully 45% do not have any retirement assets at all. And older Americans \\u2013 between the ages of 55-64 - only have a median of $12,000 in their IRA or other retirement accounts.
Diane Oakley\\u2019s organization does research on America\\u2019s retirement trends and directly knows a lot about our preparedness as a nation for retirement - because she\\u2019s been involved in retirement planning, social security and related issues at the highest levels of government. Diane shares some rather shocking statistics on retirement. For example, while most people need a certain multiple of their income to maintain their lifestyles in retirement, 90% of us are grossly behind where we should be on retirement savings, in an era when \\u201cdefined benefit\\u201d plans have been replaced by \\u201cdefined contribution\\u201d plans \\u2013 so we have no guarantee of the income we\\u2019ll have in retirement and are essentially left to sink or swim on our own. Wealthier folks generally tend to be better prepared for retirement with a stable \\u201cthree-legged stool\\u201d that\\u2019s made up of an IRA, a 401(k) and a defined benefits plan\\u2026 but they are in a minority. Most Americans, however, are way behind on their retirement savings \\u2013 and needs to step up their savings for retirement.
Diane shares her thoughts on how much we should save per year to make sure we are prepared for retirement, as a percentage of our income, and the bare minimum we should have (as a multiple of last salary) going into retirement. She also offers tips on savings schemes that are matched by the government and should be taken advantage of so we can all better prepare for a dignified retirement as jobs also continue to get scare for older Americans, specially when economic growth slows.'