Encouraging Workers to Save : The 2005 Retirement Confidence Survey

This paper reports findings of the 15th annual Retirement Confidence Survey (RCS), which points to potential solutions to the American retirement savings problem, specifically ways that could help workers save more through their employment-based retirement plans. The RCS again finds that a strong majority of Americans are skeptical that Social Security will continue to provide benefits at least equal to those received by current retirees (although confidence of the American public in Social Security has actually risen over the past decade), and helps pinpoint a number of reasons why Americans may not be preparing adequately for retirement. The survey was conducted in January 2005 through 20-minute telephone interviews with 1,253 individuals (1,001 workers and 252 retirees) age 25 and older in the United States. Random digit dialing was used to obtain a representative cross section of the U.S. population