I'll Never Retire!

The title of this post is being a tad glib, but it's hard not to believe it when you read facts like these in Erza Klein's excellent post about the "Retirement-Security Problem":

The failure [of the 401(k)], experts say, basically, is this: The typical worker approaching retirement needs about $250,000 in a 401(k). Most don't come close. The average is closer to $98,000 - only a bit more than a third of the recommended amount.
... On average, baby boomers can expect to subsist on an income of about 77 percent of what they earned in their peak working years. For Gen-Xers, it's 65 percent. And if they have the bad fortune to retire during a market slump, well, it's not clear what they'll do.

Sigh. Building up a 401(k) requires you to have been playing in the stock market casino for a LONG time. And for those of you who, like me, have had to jump from job to job and also work as independent contractors for a while, you know that a constant presence in the job market is not a luxury that's easy to afford.