There’s a new number making the rounds that says that the median amount American workers have saved for retirement is just $955.
Yes, you read that correctly.
That figure includes people with no retirement savings at all. Using workers who had at least a positive retirement-savings balance, the median savings totaled $40,000, according to the National Institute of Retirement Security.
No matter which number you use, neither is necessarily enough to fund a retirement that could last decades as people live longer. It also won’t cover the estimated healthcare costs and long-term-care costs older adults are likely to incur.
“It’s not a sign that it’s going well,” NIRS Executive Director Dan Doonan told MarketWatch. “At the end of the day, we are living more years in retirement, fewer retirees receive pensions and affordability is a concern.”
“A retirement crisis is a conversation about affordability; 30 to 40 years ago, pensions were provided by many employers. That’s changed and there’s a lot more challenges — there’s a lot of cross-pressures today,” Doonan said, citing the costs of purchasing a home, paying for childcare, and saving for college and retirement simultaneously.
Social Security itself faces a financial crisis unless action is taken by Congress. The Old-Age and Survivors Insurance trust fund, which pays out retiree and survivor benefits, is expected to be depleted by the fourth quarter of 2032, according to Social Security’s chief actuary. At the point of insolvency, Social Security benefits would be cut by about 20%.
But not everyone agrees with the NIRS numbers.
Andrew Biggs, a senior fellow at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute think tank, said the $955 number is off base, in part because it assumes that every American adult should be saving for retirement at every point in their life.
Very-low-paid workers also shouldn’t be saving, Biggs, author of “The Real Retirement Crisis: Why (Almost) Everything You Know About the U.S. Retirement System Is Wrong,” argued — since Social Security will replace most of their preretirement earnings, and government programs such as Medicaid or Medicare will cover their health costs in retirement.
“If you’re currently on welfare, do you need to be paying into a 401(k)? Young people also shouldn’t be saving; their incomes are low and they often have debts,” Biggs said. “Public-sector employees also shouldn’t be saving in retirement accounts, since practically all of them have … pensions. Additionally, Fed data show that a meaningful number of people save for retirement outside of formal retirement plans — think of farmers or small businessmen whose assets will generate income in retirement.”
date:2026-02-11 14:17:00