Affordability Estimator

You pick a flat % of gross income to set aside. Nothing else is modeled — no investment growth, taxes, Social Security, or pension. Quick and rough.

You pick the income you want in retirement; the tool computes the monthly saving needed to fund it after Social Security and any pension. Inputs: Target income (share of current income to replace, ~70–80%), Current age (sets years to 65), Return (real, after-inflation growth), Contribution type (pre-tax 401(k) cuts federal/state taxable income — not FICA; post-tax doesn't; pre-1978 there were no 401(k)s so it's post-tax), and Employer match (free money, 401(k) only).

The math: target − Social Security − pension = what your savings must replace; × 25 = the pot needed at 65 (the "4% rule": withdraw ~4%/yr, raised with inflation, lasts ~30 yrs); then solve for the steady yearly saving that grows to it at your real return, minus the employer match.

Social Security and a pension are income you'll receive in retirement, so they reduce ("offset") how much your own savings must cover — that's why they're subtracted above.

SSA's official progressive formula on your income: 90% of the first slice of average monthly earnings, 32% of the next, 15% above — capped at the SS earnings max. SSA bend points ↗ find your year's row; the two dollar amounts are the slice thresholds. SSA earnings cap ↗ the max earnings counted that year.

A traditional employer pension that pays a set monthly amount in retirement. The three modes:

• Until cutoff — includes a pension payout in the retirement math for chart years up to the cutoff year, and none after it (reflecting that pensions became uncommon).
• Always — includes a pension payout in every year.
• None — never includes a pension.

Cutoff (auto 1989) — how it's found: for each year, coverage = active DB participants ÷ all private workers. "Active participants" = workers currently earning a DB benefit that year (participating; includes not-yet-vested). Example — 1980: 30.1M ÷ 74.2M ≈ 41%. Coverage peaked ~44% in the mid-1970s and fell; 1989 is the last year it was ≥ 30%, so the default counts no pension after then. DOL Table E7 ↗ the "Total Defined Benefit" column = active DB participants by year (thousands) — the numerator. FRED USPRIV ↗ all private employees — the denominator.

Payout (auto): a pension is collected at retirement, so we use the level at the year you'd turn 65 — SSA's median private pension for retirees aged 65+ ($8,844 in 2010) — scaled by real median income to that retirement year, then expressed in the chart year's dollars. SSA 2010 pensions ↗ "Private pension or annuity" → "Median pension income"; read the "Aged 65 or older" column ($8,844) — not the first column ($14,400 = ages 55–61, mostly still working). Census median income ↗ the series used to scale the payout across years.