I think the personal responsibility experiment of 401k’s is proving to be a failure. Yes, responsible people with sufficient incomes are somewhat at fault for not using the available retirement vehicles. But if individuals can’t be trusted to tend to their own future, we should probably be mandating retirement savings. And with that increasing minimum wage and considering UBI’s to make it reasonable for people save and have money in retirement.
But thanks for the sympathy for the downvote brigade. Merely suggesting personal responsibility seems to bring on the hate in lemm personal finance discussions. I have coworkers and friend’s with 6 figure incomes, top 75% of USA household incomes. They hardly use their 401k’s and use Roth IRAs when they have the means to be maxing those out.
I mean, I don’t disagree with you, but we both know people will reject that as government overreach and call it socialism. Esp in the USA culture, people are in love with their own ignorance above all else and will justify to you how their 10 year car loan is ‘worth it’ despite the objectively poor choice that it is.
My favorite irony is telling people I use savings and 401K matching and them telling me that I am ‘wasting money’ saving/investing because ‘you’ll just die of cancer in the future before you can spend it’. It’s just… pure bitterness and a willful lack of self-respect.
I love the comments in these discussions that are like “Fuck hedge funds, fuck investing, fuck the stock market, fuck 401ks. Bring back pensions.” And then I have to explain that pensions are investing in the stock market and actually own like 20% of common traded mid and large size company stock. Apparently folks want the benefit of being in the stock market without the personal responsibility to do it themselves, but in the process get to hide their guilt of personally investing in the market themselves. But that’s okay, and that’s why I think we probably should have mandatory minimum retirement savings and investment programs.
I think the personal responsibility experiment of 401k’s is proving to be a failure. Yes, responsible people with sufficient incomes are somewhat at fault for not using the available retirement vehicles. But if individuals can’t be trusted to tend to their own future, we should probably be mandating retirement savings. And with that increasing minimum wage and considering UBI’s to make it reasonable for people save and have money in retirement.
But thanks for the sympathy for the downvote brigade. Merely suggesting personal responsibility seems to bring on the hate in lemm personal finance discussions. I have coworkers and friend’s with 6 figure incomes, top 75% of USA household incomes. They hardly use their 401k’s and use Roth IRAs when they have the means to be maxing those out.
I mean, I don’t disagree with you, but we both know people will reject that as government overreach and call it socialism. Esp in the USA culture, people are in love with their own ignorance above all else and will justify to you how their 10 year car loan is ‘worth it’ despite the objectively poor choice that it is.
My favorite irony is telling people I use savings and 401K matching and them telling me that I am ‘wasting money’ saving/investing because ‘you’ll just die of cancer in the future before you can spend it’. It’s just… pure bitterness and a willful lack of self-respect.
I love the comments in these discussions that are like “Fuck hedge funds, fuck investing, fuck the stock market, fuck 401ks. Bring back pensions.” And then I have to explain that pensions are investing in the stock market and actually own like 20% of common traded mid and large size company stock. Apparently folks want the benefit of being in the stock market without the personal responsibility to do it themselves, but in the process get to hide their guilt of personally investing in the market themselves. But that’s okay, and that’s why I think we probably should have mandatory minimum retirement savings and investment programs.