Americans just aren't doing well at saving for retirement—a third of them have exactly nothing put away.
That's according to a survey from GoBankingRates, which found that the news gets even worse.
While 33 percent said they had nothing saved, another 23 percent admitted to having less than $10,000 set aside for retirement—an amount that could be wiped out by a single financial emergency, such as unexpected medical expenses—and another 10 percent said they had saved somewhere between $10,000–$49,000.
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That's not exactly going to last through retirement, particularly for women—who not only live longer than men and are more likely to face higher medical bills once they do leave the workplace, but have less saved for retirement.
In fact, women are 27 percent more likely than men to say they have no retirement savings (and way more likely to end up in poverty once they stop working).
It gets worse: two thirds of women (63 percent) say they have no savings, or less than $10,000 in retirement savings, compared with just over half (52 percent) of men.
And the gap between men's and women's retirement savings widens as balances get higher.
While men and women are about as likely to have between $10,000–$99,000 saved for retirement, men are twice as likely as women to have savings balances of $200,000 or more.
While the survey found that millennials were the most likely generation to have nothing saved for retirement (42 percent of them haven't even started), pity the poor GenXers, who are still trying to recover from the Great Recession.
Fifty-two percent of GenXers have less than $10,000 saved, which is not all that surprising considering how hard they were hit by the financial firestorm of 2008.
In fact, GoBankingRates cited The Fiscal Times as saying that the Great Recession cost GenXers 45 percent of their net wealth on average.
Considering that this group is still struggling with mortgages and children entering adulthood (and likely college tuition and credit card debt), not to mention caring for aging parents, they're really behind the 8-ball when it comes to retirement preparation.
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