Here’s why common retirement advice is getting LOLs from some Millennials on Twitter

This week, a vocal slice of Millennial Twitter is up in arms about financial planning advice which suggests that 35 year-olds should already have two years salary saved for retirement. 

The source of the hubbub was an article published back in early January quoting unnamed experts at Fidelity Investments who cited benchmarks for retirement planning, most notably that you should have a year of current salary saved at 30 and, by 35, two years of current salary. 

It’s not exactly a radical proposal, at least from a mathematical perspective, where the bigger the initial investment, the greater the reward at the end of 30 or more years of compounding interest. For years this laddering-up of retirement savings has been presented as the best way to prepare.

But to Millennials burdened with student debt, rent and mortgages, car payments and, increasingly, the cost of raising children, the math of the argument is easily lost in the pressures of day-to-day budgeting. 

This tweet sums up the reaction best:

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA https://t.co/WxAvu5Ujfo

— Roisin O’Connor (@Roisin_OConnor) May 15, 2018

The site Indy 100 has a roundup of the often-hilarious reactions.

Emotions aside, the real advice that everyone should take to heart is this: Save as much as possible.

• Saving 15% a year starting at 25 should actually get you to the one-year-of-salary goal by 30, thanks to compounding
• Saving something is always better than saving nothing
• According to Clark Howard, it’s also important to reduce debt to or as close as possible to zero to increase freedom and spending power in retirement years.

As the saying goes, you’re not getting any younger. At 30, retirement seems a distant dream, but the reality is that it gets here faster than almost anyone expects. Planning well by reducing debt and saving as much as possible, increases the likelihood that those retirement years are comfortable and happy.