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An article in Employee Benefits News paints a dim picture of retirement. One that may reflect the real world beyond the HumbleDollar community.
Here again we are relying on a survey so who knows how accurate, but I bet worrying and anxiety over money in retirement is not uncommon. Can you imagine retiring with no clue about the viability of your finances?
It says retirees are struggling to make their savings stretch.
According to Schroder’s 2025 U.S. Retirement Survey, retirees are increasingly concerned about their financial security once leaving the workplace.
Only 40% believe they have saved enough for retirement.
62% admit they are unsure how long their savings will last.
92% worried about inflation eroding their assets and 86% citing higher-than-expected healthcare expenses.
Not fun; 36% report that money-related anxiety is affecting their overall health, 25% have lost sleep over financial concerns, and 27% spend an hour or more each day worrying about money.
It has been reported that only 32% of U.S. households prepare a monthly budget, and of those 84% say they’ve sometimes exceeded their budget. However, a 2023 Harris poll indicated that about 74% of Americans age 18 and older have a monthly budget.
The Harris survey found that 83% of Americans say they overspend, and 84% with a budget say they exceed it. 44% say they usually use a credit card to pay for the additional purchases they make when going over budget.
I’d suggest this is a source of some of the worry reported in the main stream media (MSM). It would be reasonable for one to assume that overspending may become chronic as one ages.
Schroder’s 2025 U.S. Retirement Survey: “says retirees are struggling to make their savings stretch.” And “92% worried about inflation eroding their assets and 86% citing higher-than-expected healthcare expenses.” These are areas the policy makers may provide help, but it will never occur given the amount of denial and apathy in Congress.
Interestingly, there is a wide divide about priorities in the electorate. Only 39% of Democrats, 52% of independents and 62% of Republicans saw inflation as a priority issue in a poll taken in 2024.
To be honest, I don’t stress about money every day, but ever since starting my FIRE journey, it’s always in the back of my mind. I’ve become much more intentional about how I spend, knowing that every choice can bring me closer to my financial goals. Not sure if that counts, but it’s definitely a shift in mindset.
Considering what the median amount is that people have saved for retirement I am not surprised. The median social security amount a month isn’t enough for anything but a very basic lifestyle where you are one car repair away from disaster.
Back when I was teaching college student (mostly traditional age) one of them said that everyone needed to retire at 40 to give young people a chance. I immediately said that was a great idea; I’d enjoy 50 or 60 years of retirement at their expense. Most of the class laughed or looked horrified at the thought.
I have found that younger people have trouble imagining their future. Part of that has to do with the fact that one’s frontal lobe doesn’t fully develop until you are about 30 (helps you anticipate long term consequences of current choices) and part of it, I think, has to do with having a great deal of trouble imagining themselves as, for example retired and what that entails.
Because of that I had one of their projects be to talk to someone in retirement, 5 years out from it, and 10 years out from it and ask them a number of questions, including what they’d advise younger people to do with respect to having enough for retirement. I then had them write about if anything anyone said affected their thoughts on how they’d plan for retirement, what their plans will be, and what the HR department of companies should do because of what they learned from whom they talked with (it was an intro to management class; they also had to add some business journal articles on the subject too). Most of the students found this eye opening and many thanked me for that assignment.
I think people have trouble planning because we don’t make this part of every day life from when people are young that we talk about. My parents used to hate that I worked in outdoor adventure (paid below minimum wage due to giving us room and board). I loved it because I got to work in a number of states and countries. They told me I’d regret it when I was retired (eg bring down my income average for social security). I shrugged them off because I couldn’t afford to travel without working in other countries.
Of course as I was older (and I did change my career at 40ish because of this) I realized what they said was true – oops. That meant I had to be incredibly frugal to “catch up” in what I had in my retirement accounts. I also waited until 70 to take social security as I needed the higher amount (I could have used it sooner due to career wrecking cancers).
I think we need to figure out how to get younger people understand the reality of retirement, decisions that need to be made when they are younger (like my students learned with their class assignment), and not ignore how difficult it is for younger people to actually imagine what their reality could be given different decisions they make now with respect to retirement.
I believe this is the most visible result of moving from pensions to 401k as the major source of retirement. By transferring the risk from the company to the retiree, the worry began. Yes, I complain about the price of groceries and health care, but only because I have a memory what they cost years ago.
many people have moved from nothing to something in the form of 401k Pensions only ever covered around 50% of private sector workers.
I would agree if you were required to contribute to the 401k. Access is totally worthless if you can’t really contribute to it.
I read the article. I will say that last year when Spouse retired, I did worry about having enough money for our expenses. Now that we are almost 18 mos out, I see how things are going and am not worried like I was. It just took a little time to get into a routine. Chris
On the other side, there are more retired people (both as a number and as a percentage of the population) than ever before. That we can have so many people living without earning is a hallmark achievement. I guess people worrying about something that’s pretty much new (decades of life without employment) isn’t all that surprising.
It’s probably more a factor of life expectancy and declining birth rates.
Fifty years ago fewer people made it to 65 and fewer lived more than a few years if they did.
I think you’re really on to something in that this is a relatively new phenomenon. The achievement will be if we don’t experience hoards of boomer retirees going broke.
We just shouldn’t be surprised if it happens.
We boomers break everything we touch due to being part of the population bubble. When enough of us reach the age we have to take money out of our retirement accounts it is going to affect the stock market due to the smaller size of the groups of people who start to be able to focus on putting more money into retirement. That difference will not be made up by the twenty countries who have invested the most in our stock market as they also will be having their own boomer problem. It won’t be made up by 3rd world investing in our market (they aren’t in the top 20). We need more, not fewer, younger immigrants who can pay/buy into the “system” to shore it up and make up for the fact that we have too few people in some of the decades under us.
I am absolutely not surprised by the results (if they are indeed true).
I’ve mentioned before that I attended a few ‘retirement ready’ seminars at my former workplace. The meetings were designed for people who were five years or less away from retirement.
There was always at least one person (and usually 3 or 4) in attendance who weren’t even aware their own employer was putting money aside for them for retirement. They had no idea how to access the account and, of course, no idea what the balance of that account was.
It’s probably a gross over-generalization, but my own experience during my workforce years indicated a vast majority of people are unable to plan a day or two ahead, much less 30 or more years in advance. It makes me wonder how many HD readers had careers where planning ahead was a necessary skill. For me, it certainly was.
You are right. I ran similar programs. We called them Thinking About Retirement and ran them at night so spouses could attend. We brought in people from SS to talk.
As you said most people had no idea about the plans we offered and how they impacted retirement. in some cases the spouse, the wife in most cases, didn’t even know something like the 401k existed.
When cafeteria plans, and high deductible policies with HSAs became a thing I told the office manager at the medical practice I worked for I would forgo a raise if they adopted all the programs and the next year they did. I can’t remember if I didn’t get a raise though.
In the latter part of the 1980s when my employer implemented a matching 401K, the company provided educational material for the employees. I wrote the newsletters for the union, and always included a section on using the 401K that included exactly what employees at various pay scales had to do to max out the match.
Our results were not great, very similar to what you have just described. No surprise that people did so poorly on the financial literacy quiz.
Nobody pays attention even when it’s in their best interest. Very frustrating, at least it was to me.
The survey results don’t surprise me at all Dick. My circle of friends seem to know much more about their favorite sports team than they do about their finances.
My circle of friends seem to enjoy commiserating over how broke they are, how they have only $20 in their bank account, or how they could never save up for a down payment for a car, or for an important procedure. Yet there’s always room for a concert here and there, or food delivery, or online shopping. And I know they have 10s of thousands in debt… I worry for them, but I also feel very out of touch in those moments, and handing out advice is not often well-received.
A friend was complaining about grocery prices. Same friend doesn’t use the stores digital coupons, and often uses door-dash for all sorts of food and beverage deliveries. Self inflicted injuries I’d say.
Dan – I was going to make a similar comment about deliveries. In my urban neighborhood and surrounding areas it is a common occurrence to see pizza, Uber Eats, and Doordash deliveries to homes and apartments. I just can’t wrap my head around, for example, having Doordash deliver a Chipotle burrito.
It’s absolutely stunning the things people will door dash, like $20 for a drink from Starbucks, or yes, a chipotle burrito that now cost double or triple. I’m certainly convinced that frequent use of door dash is a clear sign of poor financial decision making. And don’t give me the bs about “I make this much an hour so I’m actually saving money by…” Yeah right 🙄
None of those problems in my rural NH town. We don’t have ANY fast food restaurants, nor any delivery service, even for pizza. 😱
Makes it easier to eat a healthy diet.
My inclination was to accept the results too.
We had an increase in our HOA fee from $900 to $950. One of the men in our building went bonkers on a text string about the outrageous increase, ranting about affordability, claiming he couldn’t sell his unit because of the fee, etc.
I get the impression he is one of those folks despite belonging to a golf club.
It’s not like the HOAs are for-profit entities; the fees reflect the costs of maintaining the property. This isn’t to say that oversight of the budget isn’t necessary, but in my experience the boards do their due diligence when it comes to spending money.
You’re right. I’m on the finance committee and that’s what i tried to tell him.
HD readers and certainly posters are an outlier demographic, they probably worry about things the very great majority of retirees don’t even think about through ignorance or lack of interest. And those worries are probably less justified than for the others.
I don’t think any of those numbers are surprising. We all know that lots of people have retirement plans that are broadly “work til I drop” or “hold on til SS age”.
Question is what’s the point of handwringing over survey results? It’s too late for those surveyed, they’ve been dealt their hands and played them well or badly. It’s the next generations that you should be concerned for. And not trying to undermine your hated FIRE and claiming it has no financial educational value is part of that if you are really concerned.
I don’t hate FIRE i simply say it is not what the well publicized FIRE folk present it to be. And those who read and accept it all are mislead.
And, it can’t be achieved by but a handful of higher income people.
The blogger called A Purple Life has been retired since 30 splitting her expenses 50/50 with her partner. Her job was in marketing.
I used to think when you posed questions you were actually curious and interested in people’s answers, but I think perhaps I was wrong. As I explained on a different thread you started, my average income over the past ~15 years has been around the US median and I’ve been in the position to retire comfortably since I was in my early 50s. And yet here you are saying it can’t be achieved by any “but a handful of higher income people”.
Your statement that “those who read and accept it all are mislead [sic]” was also refuted in that thread; Kristine and I both explained how our reading FIRE blogs helped us on our journeys to financial independence. You didn’t respond to any of the points either one of us made.
As mytimetotravel suggests below, and as others have suggested previously, you might find spending time on Bogleheads enlightening.
Early 50s is not the same as mid 30s or early 40s which is what I referenced. And no, achieving thirtyish retirement is not possible for the vast majority of workers.
I also said I have yet to find a FIRE actually retired and not earning some income, plus I question whether going from age 35-40 to say age 65 on what was previously accumulated to early retirement has been experienced.
As I recall, Kristine retired at 55 with a pension and a spouse with his own income and then relocated to a lower cost area. That is not unreasonable nor is it FIRE.
So it doesn’t count if you have a spouse with their own money? As for age and relocation choices those are personal bits of the equation.
Can you draw SS at 55? No – well that is mild RE.
You’re the one hung up on it having to be in the 30s. I bet not a single other person here believes that is the only flavor of FIRE.
I second a recent suggestion that you spend your social media time over at Bogleheads instead of on these random FIRE blogs. It will be good for your blood pressure and might broaden your outlook. Sure, very few people are going to retire completely in their 30s, but 40s and 50s are a different matter. In any case, what’s wrong with interspersing retirement with work? Suggest reading “The Three Boxes of Life” on that very topic.
It is at least odd that someone who is so concerned about income during retirement should be so down on people who are mega-savers.
Given the numbers we see for how much – or rather, little – people have saved for retirement, this survey shouldn’t be a surprise.
If you are referring to me, you have missed my point entirely. Nothing against savers of any kind.
My point was that FIRE as presented in all the publicity does not present full stories or all the facts and the concept has not been tested over 30 years. Few who claim to be are retired and actually living off investments accumulated in 10 years or so.
Let’s not make this another thread about your inability to see the good in FIRE because you think a few bloggers are frauds.
FIRE is important because it is a big enough thing to hook people in and get them thinking about their own futures and the art of the possible. Not that it’s a guarantee or anything. There is more information available for free through various FIRE bloggers that at least have a chance of engaging curious younger readers than any number of grandpa lectures about “always save”. There has to be a “so what”. The idea of FI, not being beholden to the man and not running the consumer treadmill of more kids, more house, more car, bigger debt is the carrot. That’s a way more appealing message than save, live frugally and still work til you are 70.
It’s funny that prior to retirement I was the one in this couple who worried about saving enough for retirement as my wife really had no interest in our portfolio.
Since confirming with a fee only financial advisor prior to retirement, and every few years since, I no longer worry about our nest egg covering our expenses. Part of the reason that is the case is we inherited a very moderate amount from my parents, but this has allowed us to cover our expenses for about seven years before claiming Social Security. We are able to live on a very moderate income level is we have no debt, and we live a fairly frugal lifestyle.
Now that we are retired it is my wife that becomes anxious when the credit card statement arrives (we put about 90% of our expenses on it, but pay off monthly). I am chill when it comes in however as I know we are in good shape financially. The thing I do keep an eye on however is our taxable income as I am trying to convert my wife’s entire traditional IRA to a Roth before we hit 70 in a few years and then would have to take RMDs from my traditional account. This necessitates tapping my parents traditional accounts until a certain income, then switching to their Roths. Soon when my parents Roths zero out I will have to tap my brokerage accounts.
A bit confused. What you inherited from parents was IRAs?
Yes, along with some cash from the sale of their house.
Both traditional and Roth it sounds like.
Correct.
That’s what i was thinking, but i get negative arrows just for asking.
Ignore the haters 😎