> That is: I expect to have a whole working life where I don't need to put aside anything. As long as I afford my house, car, holidays etc - I'm fine.
As an American, I think this may be the hardest thing to wrap my head around. Since I was a kid I (and anecdotally, many of my peers) have been told to never rely on a government or business-sponsored pension. What happens if the government swings in a different direction in the 3 decades before I retire? What if a couple bad administrations screw things up? What if the company who has my pension goes under or poorly invests it?
It seems that having nothing saved for yourself for your decades-away end of life care is putting A LOT of trust in a system that is less than 100 years old. I think this is where my desire to trade earnings for government services comes from... I can't guarantee that the services will be there for me, but if I manage my money conservatively I can more-or-less guarantee that it will be there.
Keep in mind that I'm also a software engineer, giving me the privilege to choose higher earnings over government services. If I were lower-income or in a line with less future earnings potential I might feel differently.
Yes we trust our government a lot. Too much probably. But we also don’t have much choice given how taxes work (high, progressive). The US is pretty special in that the working majority has been led to believe that low taxes and a small welfare state works in their advantage. Every poor person is just a temporarily embarrassed millionaire and so on.
If there was suddenly a broad political support in the US for a pension system guaranteeing anyone to retire at 65 with at least a minimum wage equivalent - then that would increase your taxes and make it harder for you to set aside part of your above-average income.
Same if voters suddenly realized that state funded maternity leave would be a good thing. Again a huge, expensive tax funded reform.
We have had all these reforms. Single payer healthcare, Free higher education, 1-2 years parental leave (state, not employer funded) etc.
All of this means I pay 30% income tax, a hefty payroll tax, and 10-25% vat on most goods - which in turn means I can’t set aside a ton of money for retirement. So in a weird sense we made ourselves dependent on the state, even those of us with high incomes are.
As an American, I think this may be the hardest thing to wrap my head around. Since I was a kid I (and anecdotally, many of my peers) have been told to never rely on a government or business-sponsored pension. What happens if the government swings in a different direction in the 3 decades before I retire? What if a couple bad administrations screw things up? What if the company who has my pension goes under or poorly invests it?
It seems that having nothing saved for yourself for your decades-away end of life care is putting A LOT of trust in a system that is less than 100 years old. I think this is where my desire to trade earnings for government services comes from... I can't guarantee that the services will be there for me, but if I manage my money conservatively I can more-or-less guarantee that it will be there.
Keep in mind that I'm also a software engineer, giving me the privilege to choose higher earnings over government services. If I were lower-income or in a line with less future earnings potential I might feel differently.