When it comes to people’s feelings about their retirement readiness, 68% of Americans with access to an employer-sponsored defined-contribution plan cited inflation as their top concern, according to a new State Street survey.
That worry far exceeded the second most cited concern: medical expenses. Only 38% of respondents listed that at the top of their worries.
The survey was devised by State Street Global Advisors, the investment management division of Boston-based financial services giant State Street Corp. It hired London-based data collector YouGov to conduct the online survey of 3,553 savers in four different countries between July 20, 2022, and August 22, 2022; all respondents had access to employer-sponsored defined contribution plans. Results were compared with similar data going back as far as 2018.
Anxiety about inflation seems to impact women more than men. Fully 72% of women named inflation as the top concern, versus 65% of men.
Women are also slightly less inclined to consider changing jobs or leaving the workforce than men are. Women tend to want to continue their existing job, but with accommodations such as flexible working arrangements, the ability to transition to a part-time schedule, and an increase in health and medical benefits. Yet more women have been quitting their jobs than men in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic, “implying that women aren’t leaving the workforce because they want to, but because they feel they have to,” says the report.
Not surprisingly, a comfortable retirement remains the goal for a whopping 84% of American respondents, with most expecting to quit working between the ages of 65 and 69. More than a quarter anticipate living to age 90 or longer, however, and 30% said their top worry was making their money last until they were past age 80. A whopping 73% believe they are primarily responsible for creating an adequate income in retirement.
Employer-sponsored retirement savings plans remain the top source of retirement income that respondents are planning to draw on, with 73% of them citing this as their primary expected source. More than half of them, or 53%, listed Social Security, and just under a third (32%) said personal savings would carry them through retirement.
Only 10% thought of annuities as the solution for generating retirement income, and 1% dubbed annuities “not for me.”
No doubt the concern about having enough savings to last in retirement is why, between surveys in May 2020 and August 2022, respondents doubled their interest in contributing more to both retirement savings and short-term savings and investment accounts. In fact, when asked about specific changes they made in their retirement savings plans in 2022, 34% said they have increased their contributions.
The report notes that this seems consistent with a Federal Reserve study that found that Americans saved an additional $1.7 trillion in personal savings as of mid-2022, thanks to a combination of pandemic-curtailed spending, government stimulus and an “emergency-oriented perspective,” says the State Street report.
Only 14% of respondents said they had sought financial advice, but that was double the figure in the May 2020 survey. This, the report surmises, suggests “the savers in 2022 were paying more attention to their retirement portfolios than they have in years past.”