Login | October 04, 2024

Talking retirement savings with Generation Z

JULIE JASON
The Discerning Investor

Published: September 26, 2024

Members of Generation Z (ages 12 to 27) are continuing to move into the workforce, and they are beginning to save for retirement. If you were born between 1997 and 2012, let's talk.
I'm all for starting to save for retirement as soon as you start to earn wages, for a very simple reason: The longer you have before retirement to save and invest, the more retirement security you can create for yourself. That's the magic of compounding. (Read more about compounding at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau -- tinyurl.com/ymyv8bkn.)
Even a 12-year-old can earn money by doing odd jobs, such as mowing lawns or babysitting, and put some or all of those earnings into a Roth IRA of his or her own. (A parent will need to be the custodian or guardian. See an example of how it works at Fidelity Investments -- tinyurl.com/ms2eytnh.)
If you need some motivation to get started, consider this: You are a generation in which the full retirement age for Social Security retirement benefits is currently 67, yet the latest report from the Social Security and Medicare Board of Trustees indicates that the federal retirement program will only be able to pay 100% of total scheduled benefits until 2035 -- when the oldest of you will be 38 (tinyurl.com/npxc2yse).
You may tell me that you don't want to think that far ahead. That's how more than half of you feel, based on a recently released Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies' 24th Annual Retirement Survey of Workers that surveyed Gen Z's who were 18 years old or older and were working part or full time (tinyurl.com/yb2epyrz). Fifty-three percent either strongly or somewhat agreed with this statement: "I prefer not to think about or concern myself with retirement investing until I get closer to my retirement date." From my perspective, that's a clear giveaway of not understanding that time is the essential element that drives compounding.
Some Gen Z members surveyed are planning on living to age 100 or older (18%), and 15% plan to live into their 90s. These can be realistic assessments, since we are living longer (the life expectancy at age 65 for the U.S. population rose to 83.9 years old in 2022, according to the National Center for Health Statistics -- tinyurl.com/4f3z93sk). That means that Gen Z's will need enough retirement savings to support themselves for four decades after they stop working.
The time to start planning is now. Guessing how much of an effort is needed is not a good idea, yet 47% of Gen Z's surveyed did just that. They guessed about savings goals -- again, not a good idea.
This is where the need for financial literacy education at earlier ages becomes apparent. The Next Gen Personal Finance website (ngpf.org) provides financial education resources for teachers, with the organization's goal being that by 2030, every high school student will graduate having taken a one-semester course on personal finance.
To further your own knowledge outside of school, look for credible resources. Investor.gov is a website of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The site's Introduction to Investing section (tinyurl.com/3fkbnker) features details on various investment products and retirement plans, as well as the Roadmap to Saving and Investing.
FINRA, which regulates the U.S. bond market, provides sections on personal finance (tinyurl.com/bdtmbhry), investing (tinyurl.com/muyuj33k) and protecting your money from fraud (tinyurl.com/bdf9jd3t).
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau offers helpful information on how to create and maintain an emergency savings fund at tinyurl.com/56v9nnzd.
As a member of Gen Z, you have the benefit of a long, long time to build up your efforts to save for a full and meaningful retirement. I encourage you to get on track if you are not fully engaged. Your financial future is closer than you think.
Seasoned investment counsel (tinyurl.com/52nus8hz) and award-winning columnist and author, Julie Jason, JD, LLM, promotes financial literacy and investor protection. Read her latest book, "The Discerning Investor: Personal Portfolio Management in Retirement for Lawyers (and Their Clients)" (tinyurl.com/4u7h9pjs), published by the American Bar Association. Write to Julie at readers@juliejason.com. While all questions cannot be answered, each email is read and reviewed and can lead to discussion in a future column.
COPYRIGHT 2024 Julie Jason, DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106; 816-581-7500.


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