Released: October 20, 2009

Group seeks answers for retirement ‘crisis’

Source: Christine Dugas, USA Today

When Vise-Grip closed its plant last year in DeWitt, Neb., and moved it to China, Anita Oltmans lost her job. With no job, federal law prevented her from continuing to contribute to her 401(k) plan. She watched her account spiral down as the stock market crashed.

With pension plans no longer offered to all workers or frozen, millions of Americans, such as Oltmans, have been relying solely on 401(k) plans to fund retirement. Others — nearly one-third of American households — don’t have any retirement savings, according to a McKinsey & Co. report. And only 4% of middle-income married couples who don’t have a pension and are nearing retirement are likely to have enough money to last their lifetime, according to a new report by Ernst & Young.

America faces a retirement crisis, says an influential group of organizations that have started a new retirement initiative called Retirement USA. Wednesday, the group meets in Washington, D.C., to begin searching for solutions.

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