While it is common for many people to suggest that one needs about a million dollars to retire comfortably at the age of 65, there are plenty of other sources of information that indicate that a million dollars would be inadequate, and that a figure closer to one point five million or one point seven million makes more sense. Are you expecting to be a millionaire in your mid-sixties? As indicated by writer Eric Reed, if you’re like the average American, the answer is absolutely not. According to a 2018 study conducted by Northwestern Mutual, twenty-one percent of Americans have no retirement savings and an additional ten percent have less than five-thousand dollars in savings. 

A third of Baby Boomers presently in, or approaching, retirement age have between nothing and twenty-five thousand dollars set aside. The Economic Policy Institute paints an even bleaker picture, though that seems impossible. Their data from twenty-thirteen indicates that nearly half of families have no retirement account savings at all. None. Institute also found that for most age groups, median account balances in twenty-thirteen were less than half their pre-recession peak and lower than at the onset of the new millennium. The numbers are even worse for Millennials. Nearly six in ten have no retirement savings whatsoever. Based on these data and others, there really is a retirement crisis in America. In the decade to come, millions of Americans will find it difficult to continue working, but they will lack the means to stop.