never knows best...

dry as toast

I watched Frontline's special on retirement/pensions. It was a pretty sobering and depressing view of how people are going to do once they hit retirement age. I have to agree that 401Ks put an unrealistic expecation on how involved an average joe wants to get with saving for the future. Ideally we'd all be planning 30 years into the future, but live for the present is the mantra.

I'm not even planning for 30 years into the future, but I guess I was lucky (especially after seeing some of the facts presented in the show) in that when I first started working, everyone was really keen on getting on the 401K (my key 1 month milestones: start health plan and 401K; 1 year milestones: start 401K match and pension contributions), so I've been maxing my contributions since then. The scary part was the show mentioned that you will need to contribute at least around 10% of your paycheck to have a sufficient fund for retirement. I'm doing more than that, but that high minimum makes me worry that I'm not as far ahead of game as I previously though. Then again I have at least 30 years to work with...