Art by Colleen Kong at KongSavage.com

The 401k is one of the most woefully light retirement instruments ever invented. The maximum amount you can contribute is $19,500 for 2020, up from $19,000 in 2019.

The worst is the IRA which limits you to contributing only $6,000 in pre-tax dollars only for individuals making under $72,000 a year and married couples making under $119,000 a year.

Meanwhile, you have to make less than $122,000 a year as a single or $193,000 as a married couple for the privilege of contributing the maximum $6,000 in after- tax dollars to a Roth IRA, which I do not recommend before maxing out your 401k.

Give me a pension that pays 70% of my last year’s salary for the rest of my life over a 401k or IRA any time! At least with the 401k, anybody can contribute.

The average 401k balance as of November 2019 is around $106,000 according to Fidelity’s 12 million accounts, thanks to consistently strong returns in the S&P 500 since 2009.

Unfortunately, $106,000 is an incredibly low amount given the median age of an American is 36.5. Further, the median 401k amount is closer to only $30,000.

As an educated reader who is logical and believes saving for retirement is a must, I’ve proposed a table that shows how much each person should have saved in their 401k’s at age 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 55, 60, and 65.

We stop at 65 because you are allowed to start withdrawing penalty free from your 401k at age 59 1/2. Meanwhile, I pray to goodness you don’t have to work much past 65 because you’ve had 40 years to save and investment already!

Do you know how much in mutual fund fees you are paying a year? I didn’t, so I ran my 401K portfolio through Personal Capital’s free 401k fee analyzer and I’m absolutely shocked by the results! I always figured that from a percentage point of view, my mutual fund fees were small. But, when you take a small percentage multiplied by a big enough number, the absolute dollar amount starts adding up.

As you can see in the picture above, I’m paying $1,748.34 a year in fees across four mutual funds. In 20 years, I will have paid roughly $84,000 in fees based on only this amount. The second portion of the above chart shines a light on the specific fund that costs the most. In my case, it is the Fidelity Blue Chip Growth Fund with a 0.74% expense ratio.

I’ve got another fund worth about $22,000 as part of my 401K which does not show a fee, because it is a hedge fund whose fees are baked into the performance. Typical hedge fund fees are 2% of assets under management and 20% of upside. This is called 2 and 20, which is egregiously high, but it’s the only way I can get short exposure to hedge my bets.

I’ve been wanting to do a 401k/mutual fund fee analysis for the longest time, but was too lazy to do the analysis until I realized I didn’t have to do the calculations myself. Every year I want my portfolio to be as optimized as possible.

You likely won’t be able to live off your 401(k) alone in retirement, but you should be able to combine your 401(k) with alternative savings, other passive investments, and Social Security to live a financially free life when the time comes to withdraw at the age of 59.5. Most Americans don’t have pensions.

The reality is that the median account balance in the U.S. is only around $72,000 for 55-64 year olds in 2019 according to Vanguard, one of the largest 401k managers. The average 401k balance for 55-64 year olds is roughly $178,000.

But the average is screwed up to due the super wealthy. Even with $178,000 in your 401k at retirement age, you aren’t going to be living it up for the next 20 – 30 years without alternative sources of income.

Source: Vanguard balances

According to data from Fidelity, here’s the average 401k breakdown by age in 2018:

Ages 20 – 29: $9,900

Ages 30 – 39: $38,400

Ages 40 – 49: $91,000

Ages 50 – 59: $152,700

Ages 60 – 69: $167,700

Ages 70 – 79: $160,200

Given the median age of Americans is 35.3 according to the US Census Bureau, the median 401(k) balance per person should be closer to $150,000 – $500,000 according to my 401(k) retirement savings guide instead of these pitifully low levels.

In this article, I’d like to share some stories on what happened to all the missing savings because we all know we should be maxing out our 401k every year for as long as we work.