That, alone, is sad. If I had to rely soley on my 401 or 401 in conjunction with other monies to retire, then something HAS gone wrong in my life.
I've been in turmoils that upset my financial situation, one divorce being one of them (and paying her a four figure number each month) but I lived frugally, had a 3-room apt for a couple yrs, lived in a ghetto house (cheap) for a number of yrs, paying off all of her debts and mine in the meantime. Now, I don't owe ANYBODY ANYTHING, cept the house mortgage people, pay cash for everything, got some investments that I can sit on, yes, 401 that I don't have to touch til legally obligate to do so.
MY view (and again, it's only MY view), is that there is no excuse to have to keep on working when you haven't been confronted with a myriad of problems. Like here, AGAIN, I SAY HERE (!!!!), we've got several package/feeder drivers that have married in the company. Some are fellow drivers, some are office people that have been here longer than me, so you know they're making some serious $. Almost all of them, to a person, frets that they cannot retire until the economy turns around! I don't get it!
Oh, you're all gonna say, "You don't know what's happened in their life to bring them to their knees". No, I don't. But they or you don't know what's happened in my life either, other than what I've divulged here, to make me start out with nothing several times in my life. BUT, (patting myself on the back here) I DID it! Now, after all that, I'm ready and willing to retire with 31 years (no, I don't want to set some kinda all-time driving record like some do) at age 62 with no inclination to get a part-time job for extra cash or go driving a truck for some other company cuz I can't make it with just pension and early SS.
JMO, by the way