THERE’S AN ABUNDANCE of advice on how to plan for retirement. Oh, it’s good advice. But it’s also a bit complicated, often requires discipline and always necessitates actually doing something.
And let’s face it: Who needs advice? Who wants to actually do something? Here are 20 ways to ignore the experts—and wreck your chances of a financially comfortable retirement:
1. Keep thinking retirement is so far in the future that there’s no need to act now.

SOME 200 MILLION Americans say they want to write a book. Yet typing 50,000 words into a cohesive story can appear to be a monumental undertaking—and it might seem like only individuals with the freedom to retreat to a cabin in the woods will ever become published authors.
Making the long financial journey to retirement, so you quit the workforce with a nest egg large enough to replace your working income, can seem equally daunting.

SUPPOSE YOU WALKED into a restaurant and they handed you a menu without prices. Would you conclude that: (a) everything is free; or (b) something funny is going on?
I doubt anyone would choose the first option. It defies logic. Yet this is how the 401(k) industry routinely operates—and large numbers of people are falling for it. According to a 2018 survey by TD Ameritrade, 37% of 401(k) participants mistakenly believe that their 401(k) retirement plan is a free employee benefit—that it carries no fees.

WE NEED FOLKS TO STAY in the workforce longer—for their sake and the sake of the economy. And I don’t think it’s a bad thing.
I’ve written in the past about the demographic challenges facing the U.S. and other developed nations. The 10-second recap: Many of the economic issues we fret about—soaring federal government debt, lower long-run GDP growth, a shrinking Social Security Trust Fund—can all be traced to the same root cause. We’re rapidly approaching the point where we don’t have enough workers producing the goods and services that society needs.

PABLO PICASSO WAS ONE of the most influential, prolific and financially successful artists of the 20th century. Yet, if you had visited his studio at the peak of his career, you might have guessed otherwise: It was a mess and his work schedule was, at best, leisurely.
On a normal day, Picasso would stay in bed all morning and only get to work around 2 p.m. When he did work, according to a biographer,

FINANCIAL SECURITY is within your reach. Don’t believe me? Here’s a roadmap that demonstrates it’s possible for most Americans.
Sam is a 22-year-old college graduate. He begins working right after college, earning $50,000 a year. He saves 20% of his income the first year, equal to $10,000. Each year, he gets a 2% raise. This raise is over and above inflation, which we’ll assume is zero to keep things simple. In addition to saving $10,000 a year,

WHAT COULD POSSIBLY be wrong with saving like crazy, so you can retire early? That’s the notion behind the financial independence/retire early, or FIRE, movement. Yet lately, I’ve read a lot of carping about FIRE, both in articles and in the emails I receive.
Just last week, those complaints got yet another airing in The Wall Street Journal. Earlier, Suze Orman weighed in, arguing you need at least $5 million to retire early.

THE RANKS OF self-employed Americans are expected to rise to 42 million by 2020. It’s easy to understand why folks flock to self-employment. These workers report higher job satisfaction and overall happiness. The downside: They need to craft a benefits package that mirrors what they lost by leaving traditional fulltime positions.
Other than health insurance, the cornerstone of any employee benefits package is the employer-sponsored retirement plan. Most often, this is a 401(k), 403(b) or similar plan.

I OFTEN WONDER: HOW did I manage to retire early, at age 58? I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth. I never earned a large salary. I wasn’t a very good investor. I didn’t start saving for retirement until I was in my late 20s.
My future did not look bright. I graduated from college at age 23 with a degree in history. There were not many job openings for a history major.

I JOINED MY COMPANY’S 401(k) plan at age 25. Now, I’m 51. Over the intervening 26 years, there have been many market cycles, recessions, bull markets, a financial crisis and countless periods of market volatility.
Still, my 401(k) is well on its way to being big enough for a comfortable retirement. How did it get there? A third of the balance came from my contributions, a third from my employer’s matching and profit sharing contributions,

WE’RE FACED WITH a host of thorny retirement issues: Keep Social Security solvent. Make Medicare affordable. Many Americans aren’t saving enough. They want to retire earlier than they can reasonably afford. They’re effectively financially illiterate.
But in the end, you don’t need to worry about all Americans. Instead, what you need to worry about is you. Want a comfortable retirement? Here are my 10 commandments:

If your preretirement lifestyle is set with a view to what you can sustain after you quit the workforce,

IF YOU’RE IN COLLEGE right now, saving for retirement probably isn’t even a blip on your radar screen. Yet this is the time in your life when every dollar squirreled away will reap the most bang. Raising your eyebrows in disbelief at the thought of saving for retirement, while in the midst of struggling to cover tuition? My two children are in college and currently making money from summer internships. Here are the five things I tell them:
1.

YOU MAY BE SAVING and investing for retirement. But what you’re really doing is buying future income. How much income? That brings us to a little number crunching, which I hope will illuminate five key financial ideas.
Let’s start with the numbers. Imagine stocks notch 6% a year, but inflation steals two percentage points of that gain, so you collect an after-inflation annual return of 4%. If you socked away $1,000, what would it be worth in retirement?

YOU WILL RETIRE ONE day—and, if you want to spend your final decades in even moderate comfort, it won’t be cheap. Not too concerned about saving for retirement right now? Here are five uncomfortable realities:
1. You’ll almost certainly live to retirement age. Sure, you could go under a bus before then. But that isn’t something you should bank on: If you’re age 20 today, there’s an 85% chance you will live to 65,

AS I CHILD, I REMEMBER reading a series of “choose your own ending” adventure books. These novels allowed the reader, at different junctures, to choose how they wanted the main character in the book to proceed. I always enjoyed rereading these books, creating a different story each time I progressed through the pages.
At this point in my life, I’m beginning to feel like my eventual retirement is a bit of a “choose your own ending” adventure.