10-17-2008, 12:13 PM
mainerliser Wrote:fetusfacedwindbag Wrote:...or do what a responsible person is supposed to do and save up enough money during your lifetime to not have to worry about SS .....considering it isn't and never was intended to be a retirement fund....just a supplement to your own money.
i don't know what your age is though, and the hippie generation really screwed a lot up for the american mindset.... no responsibilty.
I'm 42, and have been paying into SS my whole working life! That's a butt-load of money that I could have put into MY 401K! I'm ticked that others are living off what I need to save!! At least at 25 and 26 you have plenty of time to save, and soon enough you won't have to pay SS.
The thing is that most people say things like this, but they never actually do it. I'm not saying that describes you at all, but the majority of Americans wouldn't have put that extra money into their 401K. They would have bought a new TV....and probably on some sort of finance plan at that.
Me being 25, yes it will make it SO much easier for me, but it wouldn't be difficult for you to save even at this point for retirement. I'm sure there will be something in my future with equivilent affects on my pocket as SS was and is to you, but like I said, SS was made as a supplement and not a retirement plan. Everyone is scared about SS going away, but no one really knows what is going to happen to it. The Fed is smarter than the herd (known as our population) thinks it is.
If you use the standard 10% rule (money invested should grow at a rate of 10% over a long period of time, blah blah blah). You could save enough for retirement with what you would normally think of as a car payment. You wouldn't be rich by any means, but you could have a decent little retirement supplement (to the 401K that you already have been contributing to, right?)
The retirement age is going to rise to 67 within the next little while here, so that's how long you have to save, right? Let's say that you need $35K/ year to live on when you retire. And let's say that you'll live to the age of 87???
If I did the math right, you'll need about $300K at the age of 67 to spit off $35K/ year for 20 years. That would mean you would need to put $226 a month into a savings plan. If you're not a high earner, you can qualify for a roth IRA, and you should TOTALLY get a roth over a traditional so that you're taxed up front and your money can grow tax free instead of tax deferred. I think that is something that would be totally manageable.
(oops. left out inflation. if you were interested in this at all, I can redo the math though.)
and i hope this didn't sound like i'm any sort of condescending little prick kid either because i totally didn't mean for it to sound like that at all.