Boomer Blues, Part 2: Have You Saved $1 Million Yet?
Related Reading
Take Action on This Issue
Here is how things used to be: My parents retired in 1975 when they were both 65. Their household income had been modestly sufficient, right around the national average or perhaps a little less. Their former employers gave each of them a monthly pension -- roughly equal to the amount of their Social Security checks -- and reimbursed all medical expenses that Medicare didn't cover. In addition, they had saved a little money for retirement, and they had taken out a nursing-home insurance policy.
For 16 years, my parents continued to live modestly but comfortably on their Social Security, pensions, and savings. Then both of them fell ill and required nursing-home care for four years. They died in 1995, after 20 years of retirement. There were still a few thousand dollars in their bank account.
Their story is like the story of most people of their generation, the boomers' parents. We boomers, engaging our powers of magical thinking, seem to believe that's how it's going to be for us too. But, as Mr Herbert writes, "We're not smart ... we don't plan."
Here is how things are now: Pensions are extinct. Most of us have 401(k)s or 403(b)s, and most of these are seriously underfunded. Some of this is our own fault, for not putting away enough each month. Some of this is due to the market meltdown. Some is due to the flaws inherent in the whole concept. (Stephen Gandel wrote a fine article in the Oct. 9, 2009, Time called "Why It's Time to Retire the 401[k]" -- read it and weep.)
Do the math. In 2008, the median income of a male worker -- we'll call him Bob Cratchit -- was $46,367. If he gets the current average retiree's Social Security benefit, his check will be $1,164 a month, which works out to being about 30% of his pre-retirement income. For a reasonably comfortable retirement, let's say he needs 75% of his pre-retirement income, or $2898 a month. If he follows the prudent recommendation to withdraw no more than 4% of his 401(k) in any year, he will need to start with a total of at least $520,200. And he'll need more if the market tanks again early in his retirement years.
Have your eyes glazed over? Then don't do the math. Just realize that if you hope to withdraw $40,000 a year from your 401(k) when you retire, then you'd better have saved 1 million dollars by then. Alas, as Mr Gandel points out in his Time article, few people have saved anywhere near that amount. "In fact, at the end of 2007, the average 401(k) of a near retiree held just $78,000 -- and that was before the market meltdown." That means the average retiree can expect a monthly pension-substitute of $260.
Is there a way out of this mess? Not if we're going to keep on lowering taxes and raising expenses, demanding state-of-the-art medical care without increasing costs, fighting wars that we are unwilling to fund, believing that we are entitled to have more than our parents' generation did. Not if we continue to believe in magic, not math.
There is probably only one good way out, and it isn't pretty. As Mr Herbert writes, "Shared sacrifice is not part of anyone's program." No doubt for a few years our easily-bought Congress will attempt to keep seniors out of homeless shelters, especially if well-funded lobbies encourage them to do so. But if we Americans, old and young, continue to live beyond our means -- both as individuals and as a nation -- our financial system will collapse, and shared sacrifice will finally become inevitable.
Hint: study Chinese.
LaVonne Neff is an amateur theologian and cook; lover of language and travel; wife, mother, grandmother, godmother, dogmother; perpetual student, constant reader, and Christian contrarian. She blogs at Lively Dust.
