Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Those Ever-Shrinking 401Ks and the Theft of Retirement Security
21 Dec 2011
🖨️ Print Article

For most of the 20th century, until the 1980s, each generation of retirees had a somewhat higher standard of living than the last.  With the Reagan era advent of federal policies encouraging private employers to raid and discontinue defined benefit pensions, that trend stopped.  The current generation of retirees are discovering that their 401Ks are almost never sufficient to allow a dignified retirement.  They've been robbed.  401Ks are subject to the stock market, which favors insiders, and financial managers and the retirement-industrial complex extract as much as a quarter of all 401K savings in parasitic fees.  In this Against the Grain interview James Russell explains why Wall Street loves privatized and individual retirement accounts, and hates defined beneift pensions and social security,



Your browser does not support the audio element.

listen
http://www.againstthegrain.org/files/files/atg/atg_2014.11.12_401ks.mp3

More Stories


  • Blame NATO for the Ukraine War
    Eugene Puryear
    Blame NATO for the Ukraine War
    03 May 2022
    Should we really blame NATO for the Ukraine war? The answer to that question is, "Yes!" Blame for the conflict in Ukraine can be laid at the doorstep of the U.S. and its NATO allies.
  • Marking Workers’ Day in Dispiriting Times
    New Frame
    Marking Workers’ Day in Dispiriting Times
    03 May 2022
    Previously in South Africa, millions of people were mobilised in the hope of a better future on May Day. Now, amid mass unemployment and the collapse of an emancipatory vision, that optimism is…
  • Black Agenda Radio April 29, 2022
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio April 29, 2022
    29 Apr 2022
    Covid continues under neoliberalism, new mayor unleashes NYPD, and French overseas territories vote against Emmanuel Macron.
  • Neoliberal Policies Worsen the Covid Pandemic
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Neoliberal Policies Worsen the Covid Pandemic
    29 Apr 2022
    Dr. Johnny Eric Williams is Chair of the Department of Sociology at Trinity College in Connecticut. Professor Williams has a special interest in the covid-19 pandemic and how it has been handled in…
  • New York City Mayor Unleashes the Police
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    New York City Mayor Unleashes the Police
    29 Apr 2022
    Josmar Trujillo is a writer and activist based in New York City. He joins us to talk about policing in New York under mayor Eric Adams. You can find him on twitter @josmar_trujillo.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us