Can You Afford to Retire? BusinessWeek
The expensive approach to retirement is to pile up so much money that you'll be safe no matter how long you live or what goes wrong with your health or the markets. But for many families, the amount required seems ridiculously out of reach, especially after the twin crashes of Wall Street and Main Street. "There's a big sense of futility and hopelessness," says Liz Davidson, founder and chief executive of Financial Finesse, a Manhattan Beach (Calif.) educational firm.
Take courage. There are more efficient and affordable approaches. As this Special Report will explain, you can have a secure retirement even if you don't have the biggest nest egg since the extinction of the Great Elephant Bird of Madagascar. In these seemingly out-of-control times, you can actually control many of the factors that will affect your retirement. "The news for most households is not as bad as they think," says Boston University economist Laurence J. Kotlikoff.
That's an important message to get across at a time when people are feeling fatalistic. Assets in IRAs and defined-contribution plans such as 401(k)s fell more than $2 trillion last year, according to the Investment Company Institute. "One of my daughters in her 20s said, 'If I put it in the market I'm going to lose it, and if I put it in the bank I won't make any money, so I might as well spend it,' " says Olivia S. Mitchell, a professor of insurance and risk management at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. As someone who has made a career out of getting people to focus on such issues, says Mitchell, "That was just a terrible shock to me."
![Sheila Jordan at her second home in Middleburgh, NY New York Times]("http://nt0.ggpht.com/news/tbn/rC1q2aq2vGbQpM/6.jpg")
New York TimesSheila Jordan at her second home in Middleburgh, NYNew York TimesHer admiration for Bird, as Parker was known, shaped her career. After spending her teenage years in Detroit, Ms. Jordan moved to New York to be closer to and more »
