I keep up with most of the dumpster fire that is current US news but I’m sorta lost on this one. I contribute to my 401k every week and have a few thousand saved up, as well as stock in the company I work for. Is all of the bad news referring to the stock market crashing? Is this general across the board or more company-specific? I consider myself decently politically educated but not so much economically.
I have only just heard this for the first time and it is interesting to me, what is the reasoning for this? I’ve been following the pattern of max out 401k match -> max out roth -> send extra to 401k, but I don’t really follow the intuition behind either strategy.
Reflect on what each tool does. They soak up today dollars to be spent tommorow. Delayed consumption for future benefit assuming your investments are fruitful and inflation doesn’t outpace your gains.
So A) do you want to lock up your money until you are at retirement age? What consumption are you sacrificing today for the benefit tomorrow? What investments are you displacing by these stock only options.
B) when you pull money out of the traditional, it counts as income and will be taxed. Part of retirement is managing your income streams to take out as much as you need/want with as little tax impact as possible. Some retirees get social security and even though they have bank, they don’t pull much from their savings.
Is it a significant impact, probably not. But it is a future risk to delay the tax. Who knows what the tax code will be? I mean, look at how the taxes are proposed to change next year. If you have an income of less than like 360k, your taxes will increase. How many retirees are pulling more than 360k per year? They just got future fucked on their tax deferment.