What a horrific ageist and bigoted comment.

This literally could mean the difference between living independently or not for a lot of people.

Not to mention everybody working today with a 401k as their retirement plan will lose value no matter their age, which means they have to work longer than planned. This is a real life impact to a lot of people.

> This literally could mean the difference between living independently or not for a lot of people.

Given that quality of assistive care matters, it could literally mean the difference between living and not for people.

Of course, on the other hand, so could runaway inflation for lots of people into the same age group (not every elderly person is self-sufficient on retirement income; many are supported by younger, working family members.)

If your retirement portfolio crumbles with a stock market correction when you’re actively retired, you have made terrible investment choices.

I have no idea why you thought that a subthread on estate tax and what it says about younger people's interest in older folks savings was the most germane place to post that, but I hope you feel better having gotten it off your chest.

If you're in all stocks (growth particularly) and retired, you're living pretty foolishly.

Depends. If you plan to draw down your savings to 0 to survive retirement maybe. But if you have enough saved up for a safe withdrawal rate to survive retirement, why not keep it invested normally and have more for your inheritors?

I don’t think I am obligated to care.

Retirees who are fortunate enough to have substantial retirement assets should take precautions against risk. If they haven’t then that’s their problem. I’m retiring in 30 years, my retirement accounts are all stocks. If I was 65 I’d have my 401(k) heavily in bonds and fixed income.

Anything else is just greed.

Phrased less sarcastically: "Millions of retirees won't have enough money to survive until they pass away."

Lots of people live on social security alone.

Phrased sarcastically again, but from the opposite point of view: “Jerome Powell wants your grandma to starve!”

Or:

Your elderly parents need to move in with you because they cannot afford to live on their own.

Savings diluted by inflation or artificial asset growth?

Can you have it both ways ?

That's a bit callous of you, not to mention shortsighted. If the Baby Boomer generation loses financial security, they will as a group A) tighten their spending habits and B) not retire.

Either of these effects on their own would hurt the younger generations, and together would make the already slow wealth building hit a brick wall. (I'm 25, for the record, and I don't expect to be debt-free or a homeowner until well into middle age)

While it really shouldn't be true, and at the level of financial mechanics probably isn't, the stock market has become the measure of the economy. Remember, pensions are dead and buried, and the nuclear family standard means that relying on your children (read: you and I) is not the bulwark it once was. That means 401(k) performance is really, really important, as terrible as that may be -- its just the reality right now.

It’s really not callous. If a boomer’s 401(k) is still heavy on stocks they’re being greedy! De-risk, people. I don’t want to let inflation tank my economy to protect a generation of greedy grandparents.

Generally 401(k) plan ratios are not managed individually. Most will have target date funds[0] that automatically transition in to progressively less-risky investments as you get closer to retirement.

The problem is... almost no financial instruments outside of stocks can provide a meaningful return any more, so even the target date funds are almost all stock.

I noted your other "time in the market beats timing the market" comment, which suggests you are an active investor. That's great! But very few Americans are active investors, and expecting them to become so is unrealistic.

Its a problem of realpolitik, which is why, going back to my original comment, you should still care, if only for how it will affect you.

[0]: Here is an example prospectus of a 2055 target date fund. Note the graph showing the changing allocation of stocks/bonds/money-market funds (or CDs). By retirement, nearly half the portfolio is still stocks. https://prospectus-express.broadridge.com/summary.asp?client...

Half stocks is a great example of diversification. If there’s a huge correction (say 20%) they’ll lose 10% — hardly something that would drop you from prosperous to poverty stricken.

If they are one of the lucky few with a defined benefit public pension, like my parents have, having your RRSP (401(k) in Canada) biased towards stocks is a sounds investment policy.

You won’t be laughing when you find out it’s your responsibility to bail them out.

Sadly this is probably the case.

A big chunk of those boomers have almost nothing. The only thing they'll have to look forward to is poverty.

Poor boomers are affected more by inflation than market crash.

So these boomers have “almost nothing” yet have a 401(k) that’s set up in the riskiest way possible, when they’re near retirement age?

Unfortunately most people with 401(k)s are in SPY as the default, boomers or not

SPY is up >2% today. I think the market wants inflation to be tamped more than they want cheap money right now.

Time in the market > timing the market. It’ll go back up.

We can always just bring in more immigrants since that seems to be the solution to every problem like this. /s

I’m actually quite impressed they haven’t started that push yet —- guessing COVID still sort of being a thing but no longer spoken about due to it polling poorly makes this a non-ideal time.

On the other hand, as there’s effectively no border enforcement during this administration, I guess they’re already accomplishing their goals without needing the media to ram “Americans can’t/won’t do the jobs” down your throat.