The Three-Legged Retirement Stool

The Three-Legged Retirement Stool Is Getting Pretty Shaky... All three legs are crumbling...

Traditionally, our retirement income came from three sources, the proverbial three legs of the stool. They were: (1) Social Security Income (2) Company Pension (3) Personal Savings
But what's happening to each of these legs? Nothing good, I'm afraid.

It's recently been reported that Social Security is now scheduled to go broke (pay out more than it takes in) in 2017. That's just 8 years away! When Social Security started, there was 40 workers for every retiree. Now that number is just 2 or 3. This math isn't adding up.

Meanwhile, company pensions are in big trouble. Most companies don't even offer a pension anymore. But those that do are, for the most part, severely underfunded.

The last leg is personal savings. The good news is that the rate of savings is increasing. Of course, it is coming from a negative number recently, so it can't really go any direction but up.

But what's happened to your retirement account statements lately? And your friends'? It isn't a pretty picture out there, is it?

The bottom line is this. Retirement is changing. We have to rely on ourselves more and more. It's a trend that is not likely to end anytime soon.