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Video & Multimedia

In reply to the discussion: Retirement options [View all]

PoindexterOglethorpe

(25,746 posts)
6. It is simply a myth that most people had jobs with good pensions.
Mon Dec 16, 2019, 11:38 PM
Dec 2019

Something like 30-35% of all workers ever had a defined benefit pension. A lot more union workers used to have them, but unionized workers were never a majority. Plus, a lot of pension plans had a very long vesting term, sometimes as long as 30 years. If you left the job one day before that, you were out of luck for getting a pension. More recently, companies have systematically underfunded their pensions, and workers are getting a third to a half of what they'd been promised. And now the exact same thing is happening in the public sector.

So it's always been incumbent on workers to save for their own retirement. This is nothing new.

And while Social Security needs to be protected, it was never intended to be a person's only income in retirement.

Latest Discussions»Retired Forums»Video & Multimedia»Retirement options»Reply #6