Only 1 in 5 workers nearing retirement are financially on track: "It will come down to hard choices"
CBSN
The rule of thumb for people who are 55 and have another decade of work before reaching the traditional retirement age is to have already socked away about eight times their salary in their retirement accounts. But the median savings of today's 55-year-olds is just $50,000, far from enough to fund a secure old age, according to a new study.
In fact, only 1 in 5 people who are 55 years old have $447,000 or more saved for retirement, or eight times the average U.S. salary, Prudential Financial's 2024 Pulse of the American Retiree Survey found. The report jibes with another recent study on Gen X's retirement readiness, which found half of those surveyed believe it would take a "miracle" for them to be able to retire.
The new findings come as the oldest members of Generation X, or people born between 1965 to 1980, are now entering their pre-retirement years, giving them a short period in which they can shore up their savings before stepping back from work. But many who are already lagging behind those savings milestones may end up unprepared — at least financially — for retirement, given that it would likely be difficult, if not impossible, to build a sizeable nest egg in a just a few years.
Washington — An independent panel tasked with reviewing the July assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, found the Secret Service suffers from "deep flaws" that enabled the attack at the Trump campaign rally, and called for the agency to undergo "fundamental reform" to carry out its mission of protecting top government officials around the world.
There is a new wave of calls for Congress to return to Washington to respond to the growing costs of Hurricanes Helene and Milton. Multiple members of Congress from hurricane-ravaged states have issued new calls for the U.S. House and Senate to respond to the depletion of funds from the U.S. Small Business Administration disaster loan fund.