I was shocked comparing my wife's 401K to my

[JDPriestly]

20. So $1 million saved and accrued in growth or interest would equal an income of about $40,000 per

year.

And if you can only save one tenth that amount, say $100,000, your income would be $4,000 per year.

Let's look at a report on actual median savings.

The median amount of outside retirement savings is $49,000 for workers ages 51 through 60, and $30,000 for workers ages 30 to 40.

http://www.towerswatson.com/en-US/Insights/Newsletters/Americas/insider/2013/retirement-savings-how-much-do-workers-really-have

So if the median worker saves $49,000 per year, based on your percentages, that person would have a retirement income of $2,000 per year earned on his savings. There is a minimum required withdrawal on 401(K)s and deferred taxed IRAs at the age of 70.

If you save 10% of your income and your work say 40 years at $45,000 per year, you save and accrue in value and interest a total of on average $4,500 per year or $180,000. Wow. You might actually get an income of almost $8,000 per year. That's less than minimum wage, and not everyone can save anything, especially not those who only earn minimum wage.

We need to safeguard Social Security more than ever. Privatizing it will not work. I'm on Social Security. I know how important it is. You can save what you want. But don't count on being able to save enough to retire on. All kinds of things can make that dream impossible -- illness, a lost job, an accident, a lawsuit, a divorce, a death in the family, depreciation on your house, loss of value in the stock market -- all kinds of things.

Social Security cannot replaced by savings and investment schemes.

To save $1,000,000 and assuming it doubles over your lifetime to $2,000,000, you have to save over a 40 year working life, $25,000 per year. $1,000,000 saved accruing interest, dividends, value, but also suffering losses and recessions could grow to $2,000,000, But $1,000,000 divided by 40 years of your working life is $25,000, per year saved.

If you make on average $50,000, you are not going to be able to save $25,000 per year. Even if you make $200,000 on average for year, you probably won't save $25,000 during the years in which you are raising and educating children.

The idea of a 401(K) is great for people who earn a lot of money, but for most of us it is a nice little extra, but cannot support us in retirement.