15 Surprising Retirement Statistics Every Investor Should Know

If you delve into the world of retirement-related statistics, you'll find a lot of surprising numbers, many of which reveal a disconnect between what people expect of and what they experience in retirement. Here's an example: While many people expect Social Security to provide much of the income they'll need in retirement, it only delivers about 40% of a retiree's pre-retirement income.

Here are a big bunch of surprising statistics related to retirement, with many coming from the respected 2022 Retirement Confidence Survey.

5 Stocks Under $49
Presented by Motley Fool Stock Advisor
We hear it over and over from investors, “I wish I had bought Amazon or Netflix when they were first recommended by The Motley Fool. I’d be sitting on a gold mine!" It's true, but we think these 5 other stocks are screaming buys. And you can buy them now for less than $49 a share! Click here to learn how you can grab a copy of “5 Growth Stocks Under $49” for FREE for a limited time only.

According to the Retirement Confidence Survey, 73% of American workers express confidence in their ability to have a comfortable retirement. That looks like a very positive stat, but it also means that 27% did not express such confidence. And a closer look at the survey results shows that only 28% said that they felt "very" confident. There's much room for improvement here.

The survey notes that 26% of workers feel very confident that they are doing a good job preparing for retirement, and another 43% feel somewhat confident. This is not entirely surprising, because most of us are leading fairly busy lives, with plenty of demands on our time from work, family, friends, and more. Thus, millions have not been spending much time thinking about or preparing for retirement.

If you're feeling stressed when you think about your retirement, wondering how you're going to make it a comfortable one, you're not alone. The Retirement Confidence Survey found that 58% of workers reported "that they either strongly or somewhat agree with the statement that preparing for retirement makes them feel stressed." Even for those who do take some time to engage in retirement planning, it can be hard to know where to start, and in many cases, what the best steps to take are. For example, should you invest first in your 401(k) at work and then in an IRA? How much should you be socking away? The answers can sometimes be different for each of us, depending on our circumstances.

ALSO READ: Planning to Retire in 2022: A Complete Guide

With the survey finding that two-thirds of workers (or their spouses) have saved money for retirement, this doesn't mean that they've saved enough -- at all -- just that they've saved some money. That statistic also reflects 32% of workers not saying that they've saved for retirement. This is alarming, because most of us will need to rely on our savings to a great degree in retirement. Remember, after all, that Social Security isn't likely to deliver even half of what we used to earn.

Here's a particularly alarming statistic from the 2022 Retirement Confidence Survey: 34% of workers report that the total value of their savings and investments, excluding the value of their primary home, is less than $25,000 -- and, worse, a whopping 19% (roughly one in five people) have less than $1,000 saved. Clearly, many millions are woefully behind on their saving for retirement. Faring best in this survey question were the 33% who had saved $250,000 or more. Many of those folks are behind, too, though, because even if you've saved $600,000, if you're a year or two from retiring and you need to have saved $750,000, you're behind.

ALSO READ: How Much Do I Need to Retire Comfortably?

The daunting and potentially stressful nature of retirement planning is quite reasonable -- because it's vitally important. With a bad plan, or no plan at all, you might end up living off of not much more than Social Security, which could have you near poverty levels. Fortunately, you don't have to struggle alone in your retirement planning. You can read up on it and learn a lot from experts, and you might also consult a financial professional. You can find a "fee-only" financial advisor near you via NAPFA.org. (Fee-only means he or she won't be collecting commissions for selling you on this or that.)

Per the survey, 33% of workers are currently working with a financial professional, with even more expecting to do so.

5 Stocks Under $49
Presented by Motley Fool Stock Advisor
We hear it over and over from investors, “I wish I had bought Amazon or Netflix when they were first recommended by The Motley Fool. I’d be sitting on a gold mine!" It's true, but we think these 5 other stocks are screaming buys. And you can buy them now for less than $49 a share! Click here to learn how you can grab a copy of “5 Growth Stocks Under $49” for FREE for a limited time only.

This next stat from the 2022 Retirement Confidence Survey reveals a disconnect in expectations versus reality. The median worker expects to retire at age 65, but the median retirement age of retirees is 62. In fact, only 13% of workers planned to retire before age 60, while a whopping 30% ended up doing so. There's a lesson here for us all: While we might make our plans and hope for the best, we should also prepare to have our plans thwarted. Things don't always go to plan.

Fully 29% of surveyed workers said they expect to retire at age 70 -- or later! This makes perfect sense, since so many are behind in their savings. Working a few years longer than you might like to can be a powerful strategy, delivering multiple benefits. For one thing, you'll have a few more years in which to save and invest, and fewer years in which your nest egg will have to support you. You might also be able to remain on your employer's health insurance plan, and you'll be able to delay starting to collect Social Security, too (more on that soon).

So why, exactly, are so many people retiring earlier than planned? Well, according to the survey, among those who retired earlier than planned, 32% said it was due to a (non-COVID-19-related) health problem or disability, while 23% said it was due to changes at their workplace. Thirty-eight percent responded that they could afford to do so -- and that's the ideal reason for an early retirement.

ALSO READ: 401(k) vs. IRA: Which Is Better for You?

Here's another disconnect between expectations and reality, per the 2022 Retirement Confidence Survey: Fully 70% of workers expect to do some work for pay when they're retired, but only 27% of retirees report having actually done so. This is not just interesting and surprising -- it's also dangerous. If anyone has been planning and depending on having earned income flowing in for some of their retirement years and that doesn't happen, they could end up with a shortfall in their retirement coffers.

5 Stocks Under $49
Presented by Motley Fool Stock Advisor
We hear it over and over from investors, “I wish I had bought Amazon or Netflix when they were first recommended by The Motley Fool. I’d be sitting on a gold mine!" It's true, but we think these 5 other stocks are screaming buys. And you can buy them now for less than $49 a share! Click here to learn how you can grab a copy of “5 Growth Stocks Under $49” for FREE for a limited time only.

This stat is only partly worrisome: 86% of workers expect Social Security to be a major or minor source of income. Those expecting it to be a minor source (57%) may not be disappointed -- but the 29% of workers expecting it to be a major source may be. Consider that the average monthly Social Security retirement benefit check was recently $1,666 -- about $20,000 annually. That's not nothing, but it's probably far from what most retirees would like to retire on.

This probably won't surprise many people, but women tend to be worse off, financially speaking, and this is true when it comes to retirement as well. For one thing, women have long been paid less, on average, than men, for the same work. They also often find themselves out of the workforce for a number of years, to raise children and/or care for loved ones. Thus, their savings and future Social Security benefits are likely to be smaller. In fact, per a 2021 report from the Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies, the average total retirement savings of women in the U.S. was recently just $57,000 -- versus more than twice as much, $118,000, for men.

ALSO READ: Women and Investing: 20 Years of Research and Statistics Summarized

Here's a good retirement stat: It's possible to make your Social Security benefits up to 24% bigger -- though you'll have to delay starting to collect them for that. Each of us has a full retirement age, which is 66 or 67 (or somewhere in between) for most of us. For each year beyond that that we delay starting to collect our benefits (up to age 70), they'll grow by 8%. Delay from 67 to 70 and you'll get checks that are 24% fatter -- though you'll get fewer of them, too. There are other ways to increase your Social Security benefits, too.

It's worth trying to increase your Social Security benefits -- because if Congress doesn't take action, by 2034 the Social Security surplus will be depleted, and there won't be enough money coming into the program from taxed workers to pay all the benefits due to retired workers. Without changes, it looks like beneficiaries may only receive $0.77 for every dollar due to them. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to shore up Social Security, so let's hope that Congress takes action -- but let's not count on it.

ALSO READ: Why I'm Not Counting on Social Security, and Neither Should You

According to the Social Security Administration, 37% of elderly male Social Security beneficiaries and 42% of female ones get 50% or more of their income from Social Security. This is even more eye-opening: 12% of elderly male Social Security beneficiaries and 15% of female ones get 90% or more of their income from Social Security. Take steps now to not be in that latter group, and if you're able to save and invest enough, you may not be in the former group, either.

5 Stocks Under $49
Presented by Motley Fool Stock Advisor
We hear it over and over from investors, “I wish I had bought Amazon or Netflix when they were first recommended by The Motley Fool. I’d be sitting on a gold mine!" It's true, but we think these 5 other stocks are screaming buys. And you can buy them now for less than $49 a share! Click here to learn how you can grab a copy of “5 Growth Stocks Under $49” for FREE for a limited time only.

The longer you have until you retire, the more you can do to build yourself a comfortable and financially secure future. Make a retirement plan, learn how to get the most out of Social Security, and save and invest regularly and diligently.

The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.