There is a new, troubling study on the financial status of most American workers. The National Institute on Retirement Security (NIRS) found that the median American worker has just $955 saved for retirement through defined-contribution plans such as 401(k) accounts. Given the expected job losses from robotics and AI, the study only deepens concerns about the economic and political pressures facing this country in the years to come.
In my new book, “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution,” I discuss those impacts from robotics and AI on our democracy. Using the most conservative estimates of job losses, the book explores how a large population of unemployed citizens will affect their relationship with the state.
We cannot maintain a “kept citizenship” while preserving the essential elements of the American republic. A large population of static, unemployed citizens poses challenges for what I call a “liberty-enhancing economy,” an economy that affords citizens independence from the state.
This study magnifies those concerns. If accurate, it suggests that even a short displacement in employment will return state support. Many jurisdictions are already launching Universal Basic Income (UBI) pilot programs. If this republic is to survive in the 21st Century, it will require developing new areas of “homocentric” jobs while avoiding predictable measures to subsidize positions that will inevitably be lost to robotics.
Notably, the study found that among those with positive retirement plans, median savings were much higher at $40,000.
Those with a defined contribution (DC) plan are far better off with an average savings of $179,082.
The takeaway from the report, for me, is the need to instill greater private savings. Some workers are barely paid above subsistence. However, we also need to educate citizens about the importance of setting aside retirement funds to the extent possible.
As I previously wrote, I am a great fan of the Trump Accounts. The $6.25 billion gift of Michael and Susan Dell (now augmented by dozens of corporations) could offer the single best hope for the survival of our system. Millions of young people will be able to experience the benefits of investments, savings and, most importantly, economic independence.
The study also shows the growing dangers of the collapse of the social security accounts. Despite assurances made when Congress established the system, Congress has continued to draw on Social Security funds to avoid reducing spending levels. The system could fail for these workers, who will not be able to draw upon money taken from their paychecks for the purpose of retirement. It is one of the most outrageous betrayals in United States history.
To this day, Democrats are opposing efforts to make major changes to guarantee the viability of the system for future generations, including the use of private investment accounts that could no longer be raided by Congress for easy money.
All politicians express alarm at the potential failure, but they attack any efforts to address the underlying problems as an attack on social security. As a result, we just drift toward this cliff knowing that most citizens have practically no other source of retirement support.
Some Wisdom From the UK
Why is it that you haven’t seen anything about Trump’s savings plan in the mainstream media?
A tax free investment of $1,000 dollars at the historical rate of return would equal $380,000.
25 million kids will be included in the plan. Do they really give a damn about the children?
Like Pelosi said, think about the children. Right?
So everyone is worried about who is and who is not saving for retirement. I would love to know the demographic breakdown of what groups were saving. If the basic demographic is toward the younger end, then I would be less concerned than if the basic demographic was older.
As for the idea people are not saving enough or at all, this is a tough problem with a very easy answer. I get it if one is at the bottom or near bottom of the economic ladder trying to save for tomorrow when one is not quite making it today.
The easy answer is this: if you can afford cigarettes, lottery tickets, beer, cable tv and fancy phones, you can afford to save for retirement. Knock off the spending on non-essentials and live within your means. It is time to grow up.
Too many schools offer a crappy education and since teacher’s unions began the downward slide began.
“Given the expected job losses from robotics and AI . . .” “Using the most conservative estimates of job losses . . .” (JT)
Why is there no focus on the literally millions of higher paying, more intellectually challenging new jobs *created* by those two industries?
A few of which include:
“Robotics Engineers, Data Scientists, Prompt Engineers, Machine Learning Engineers, Automation Engineers, Drone Operators, and Robot Technicians.”
Are we to assume that those employees displaced lack the ambition to learn new skills? And that they lack the desire for a better life?
There are two main reasons. The first is that those engineers require a decade or more of experience to be particularly useful and employers are unwilling to pay for OTJ training. The second is that there are not many positions for those jobs compared to those they are replacing. There are, right now, fewer than 500,000 EEs (electrical engineers) in the
US. There’s no need for double that many in a similar technology.
A third reason is that expertise is gained from the development of such systems and that development is shifting to China, cutting off the supply of entry level jobs.
“. . . employers are unwilling to pay for OTJ training.”
You sound like you know what you’re talking about. Until you don’t.
Here are just two such OTJ programs:
Tesla’s training for Data Collection Operators (not engineers), who are *paid* up to $48/hour.
Tesla’s START program (also paid): “Tesla START is an intensive training program that provides individuals across the U.S. with the skills necessary for a successful career at Tesla.” The company has partnered with some 12 colleges to provide that *OTJ* training.
Companies on the cutting edge have always had OTJ training programs (sometimes called internships).
Now most companies just expect recently graduated college/university students to already know how their specific systems work, and don’t bother putting any money towards OTJ. Part of that, historically, is from fears that once they get their OTJ, the new hires will leave the “family” and go to another with higher pay or better benefits, or make their own businesses, directly into competition. Better to keep your slave caste close, am I right?
“The National Institute on Retirement Security (NIRS) found that the median American worker has just *$955 saved for retirement* . . .” (emphasis added)
BS.
And it is BS because NIRS and the lead author have a socialist axe to grind: Wealth inequality is bad. Redistribution and government programs are good.
The reality:
Ages 55-64: $537,560 average retirement savings; $185,000 median retirement savings. (Pick your reliable source.)
The “New and Improved” U.S. Social Security System !
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-public/inline-images/2026-02-14_12-28-35.jpg
The sheep have been trained that the gov’t will take care of them. No need to worry about retirement income. The rich will pay for it.
“America will never be a socialist country”
-Donald J, Trump, 45th and 47th President of the United States.
Instead of weakening America, the socialists only strengthened our resolve.
MAGA is unstoppable. Elections have consequences. Hulk smash puny weak left.
GRAND ILLU$ION
Everything is “Leveraged” against other ‘Things’ (packaged investments/markets) Your 401K, 403B, FERs, CalPERS, Fidelity, Vanguard, Swab, Metals … are all collateralize “assets”, an oxymoronic term when the Stock Markets Crash as Governments Default and the House of Cards come falling down. Un-leveraged Land may have some value but is not protected from a New Government or Invasion. All investments have risk vulnerabilities.
The Golden Nest Egg you hold so securely and can be just a figment in your imagination.
Indeed a GRAND ILLU$ION -DS (circa February 14, 2026 at 8:43 PM)
The past 50 years of Computerization hasn’t real done us very good. There are some merits to what the Digitization has accomplish and the run up to today created some paradigm shifts, The Software Industry in the 80|90|20k| were plentiful and skilled Programed were able to have their shops succeed.
But the losses in hand skills like Tool & Die Machine Shops, Engineering, Drafting, Hand Coding, real people that had developed real skills have vanished and time has erased their capable minds.
Life before the Internet had Generation to Generation skills passed down face to face (not YouTubed). Apprenticeship meant you were going to invest ‘yourself’ into the work of the trade. Today it’s the “Gig Economy” no self-investment, just job to job, nomadic lifestyle.
The Amish may have it right, progress is earned through skill and efforts. Here we are on the start of a new phase of A.I., and we still haven’t learned Our lessons of the past.
Standard of living only rises when you produce more human value with less human effort
Standard of living has doubled since the 80s – if you make buggy whips, you should look for another job.
I live right smack dabb center in amish country PA. Last spring a saw and amishmen with a mule team draing the mower from a tractor, with a small gas engine on it as he mowed his fields.
You can hardly find an amishmen without an iphone – for business.
Progress is NOT earned through skill and effort – though SOMETIMES those contribute, still there is no call for skilled buggy whip makers today.
Progress is accomplished by creating more that humans value with less human effort.
“Standard of living has doubled since the 80s”
Not in terms of job security or housing security or retirement security or health security. There are certainly larger amounts of junk electronics and junk food, but that doesn’t seem like an improvement in the standard of living.
“The Amish may have it right, progress . . .”
I don’t think I’ve ever seen the words “Amish” and “progress” in the same sentence.
The Amish make nearly glacial progress; they do what they need to to interact with the outside world and tend to keep it that way. There won’t be an iPhone at an Amish dinner table. I recall a woodworker visiting an Amish furniture maker. He said he asked the Amish guy if more furniture could be produced with power tools. The Amish guy asked if that would cause him to live longer.
No idea what point John Say was trying to make. He rambles a lot.
He’s also terrible at spelling – I don’t know if he misspelled “dragging” or “draying” when he might have said “pulling”.
What about riches in Heaven?
What about hell?
Riches in heaven don’t help those old people starving or homeless still on earth. Are you asking them to kill themselves as a means of becoming rich and saving social security? That sounds like a liberals solution to poverty in old age. Government assisted suicide.
You gotta be a liberal. Eating humans as a survival tool.
Liberals are the ones who create Social Security so that old people don’t starve homeless.
. At some point might the citizen have a choice of SS or 401 k contribution? It looks like there’s a study group of newborns born between date y and ending at date x. How will this group behave later in life?
Perhaps an outside source might manage SS and congress forbidden to touch it? The SS and 401 could be a dual contribution selected? Al Green raised his cane at some point.
There’s an enormous imbalance in producers and consumers. The US no longer produces the food and goods it consumes. They couldn’t afford the goods they produce. It’s imported substandard foods and goods by 3rd world workers, globalization ruin? Competition domestic was not understood by small business? Money managers gained control of markets globally and Americans are out of jobs via production and wages inflated the substandard imported goods.
The economic future is dismal and crime has set in. Store up your money to be robbed, set up a welfare system to be gamed, Minneapolis. Child care in such a case is done by mom, dad and old granny and grampy. Cut welfare?
Very concerning PT, with the crime rate.
. If you’d bought 1000 dollars of walmart in 1972 you’d have approx 12 million dollars today. Can that be right?
It isn’t. A toaster cost 19.99 in 1972. Today you can get one for 12.99 on Amazon delivered to your door.
Almost all prices have gone down in real dollars – many like toaster have gone down in nominal dollars.
Regardless, standard of living was in arguably lower in 1972 as much as we may romaniticize the past – and I was there in 1972, life was harder, things cost more expressed in hours worked to earn them. and we all had less.
In 1972 I was 16 and made $1.60 an hour and didn’t have $100 dollars let alone $1000 dollars. Neither did most other people.
The median wage per hour in 1972 was approximately $5.25.
The national average wage index for 1972 was $7,133.80.
Without age groupings this tells us little.
Key Age Breakdown in the Report
Age Categories:
21 to 34 years: This group had a notably higher saving rate compared to older cohorts, often seen as having more time to build their savings.
35 to 44 years: Individuals begin to see increased numbers as their incomes grow.
45 to 54 years: Workers should ideally have more substantial savings, but many still lag behind.
55 to 64 years: This group saved an average of 19% of their targeted retirement savings in their 401(k) or similar plans.
The fact many older workers weren’t offered a 401K or 403B until they were past 30 or 40 makes a difference from a younger person offered one as they started their working career. Also many workers, myself included, got caught in between the company paid pension and the start of the 401K. I have both but neither as much as if one or the other had been fully funded. Still you have to discipline yourself to save for retirement. Even though I wasn’t offered a 401K until 40, have only a small company retirement, got divorced at 45 and suffered through the 2007-2008 crash was able to save more than enough for retirement and pay off my house in ten years. You just have to be disciplined and work hard at it.
Mainly you have to have an income that is sufficient to accomplish that. No amount of discipline will help if you are living in a tent and making 50 cents more a week than food costs.
I think that is a bit misleading. Pre 70’s inflation, much of the middle class could afford a home, car(s), medical care, while having a stay at home wife.
“I was there in 1972, life was harder, things cost more expressed in hours worked to earn them”
In 1972 a single family household could afford a mortgage, a car, 2-4 children, on a single parent’s factory wages. They had a guaranteed pension waiting for them with Social Security on top of that.
Productivity increases for durable goods should have kept relative prices constant while increasing the capabilities, but that’s not what happened. Instead wages fell relative to productivity, so families need both parents to work, pay someone else for daycare, and life has become increasingly difficult for the lower half of society. US companies took the excess profits and built factories overseas, displacing American factory labor out of the market.
The US is one of the worlds largest and most efficient food producers. We pretty much never import food because we can not grow it affordably. We do so because we can not grow that food at all, or because it is winter and we can not grow it now.
At the same time the US is obviously one of the wealthiest countries in the world – becaus you can buy fresh strawberries in February at a very small premium.
There is a famous scene in the movie “The battle of the Bulge” where the german general realizes germany has no hope of defeating the US – because he finds a fresh chocolate cake on a US POW.
Germany could not feed troops 100 miles from home – and the US was sending chocolate cakes by Air accross the ocean to our soldiers.
This is more so today.
We make a lot of food. That’s true. But we are also the biggest wasters of food in the world. It’s also not the healthiest. That’s why we have some of the world’s worst health in terms of population.
It’s not efficiency, it’s effectiveness. The US production of food is hardly efficient. It uses tremendous amounts of non-renewable resources, mainly petrochemicals. The US is very effective at generating waste.
Ok, now try NOT stupid.
What Happens When the Social Security Trust Fund Is Exhausted: An Alternative Contingency Policy
When the Social Security retirement Trust Fund is exhausted in 2032, old-age and survivor benefits in total must be cut by 24 percent, according to current projections. This is generally thought to be an across-the-board cut by the Social Security Administration, which would hit the poor particularly hard.
By: Mark J. Warshawsky – American Enterprise Institute ~ February 05, 2026
https://www.aei.org/research-products/working-paper/what-happens-when-the-social-security-trust-fund-is-exhausted-an-alternative-contingency-policy/
Social security is and always was a Ponzi scheme.
When Social Security was started in 1935, the average life expectancy for men was about 60 years old. The age of retirement was set at 65. It was a way to rob the people while promising a long life or retirement. Then the teachers and farmers where let in paying only a few quarters in. Then it was made a disability program too. All the time the government stealing the excess and putting worthless IOU’s into the system. Health and medicine improved and the government never changed how they operated. Now they want to screw us again because of the problems the government themselves created.
It wasn’t designed to be a “Ponzi” scheme. It was designed to provide a small income, mostly to widows who’s life expectancy was slightly longer than their husbands, who had no income and no means to obtain one. Even if their spouse’s employer offered some type of pension, which was rare, it wouldn’t have survivor benefits that carried over to their widows. It was NEVER designed to pay out for 20-25yrs. The problem, at least one of the problems anyway, is that retirement age hasn’t really changed from 65 but life expectancy has greatly risen.
It was designed to be a retirement SUPPLEMENT, not a pension. It’s funds were also not intended to be used for anything else by Congress or the Government.
Most people during this time period didn’t save for “retirement” unless they were wealthy or had professional jobs. This is a much more recent concept. Through the 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s, and even longer people pretty much worked in factories or farms right up until they died. The idea that anyone would have a large enough savings to allow them to comfortably live for another 20 years would have been absurd.
As America Turns 250, Free Speech Confidence Is Collapsing
In 2026, the United States will celebrate its 250th anniversary. We will commemorate a republic built on an extraordinary premise: that free citizens can govern themselves through argument rather than coercion—through persuasion rather than intimidation. Ideas and disagreements have moved this nation for centuries, and the ability to speak freely has been the condition that made democratic self-government possible.
By: Samuel J. Abrams – American Enterprise Institute ~ February 12, 2026
https://www.aei.org/society-and-culture/as-america-turns-250-free-speech-confidence-is-collapsing/
The $10 Trillion Bond Market Question
There is one question that should be on US economic policymakers’ minds as US Treasury bond yields grind higher, as foreigners appear to be losing their appetite for US government bonds, and as the budget deficit remains at an unusually high level. Who is going to finance the government’s massive borrowing needs?
By: Desmond Lachman – American Enterprise Institute ~ February 09, 2026
https://www.aei.org/economics/the-10-trillion-bond-market-question/
US bond market: Concerns grow over ‘$5.1 trillion fraud’ and impact of AI on Wall Street
The system relies on inflated real estate valuations, over-taxation of owners, and the systematic extraction of value from household assets to support a troubled and potentially fraudulent municipal debt model
By: bankingnews ~ February/10/2026
https://www.bankingnews.gr/en/index.php?id=855525&diethni/articles/855525/us-bond-market-concerns-grow-over-5-1-trillion-fraud-and-impact-of-ai-on-wall-street
Massive Property Tax Fraud Exposed – $5.1 Trillion Bond Scam Will Crash System
Mitch Vexler is a real estate developer and whistleblower who alleges school district appraisers are inflating property values to jack up taxes. He said that in 2018 to 2019, there was a 30% jump in property taxes, but inflation was only 2.7%. After 5 years of compound cumulative fraud, real estate was over-valued. Based only on the face value of the bonds, he estimated that the fraudulent portion of the face value is somewhere around $5.1 trillion. He said that is an extremely conservative estimate, and it is likely closer to $17 trillion.
By: Daniela Cambone ~ September 1, 2025
https://needtoknow.news/2025/09/property-tax-school-district-bond-fraud-scam-of-biblical-proportions/