There are few certainties when it comes to investing.

The stock market can seem to gyrate with little rhyme or reason, guided up or down by unpredictable news cycles and fickle investor sentiment. Average stock returns have historically trended up over long time periods, but their trajectory is hardly assured on a daily, monthly or annual basis. As the common investment disclosure goes, “Past performance is no guarantee of future results.”

Yet, according to financial advisors, there is an outlier in the realm of investing: the 401(k) match.

The basic concept of a 401(k) match is that an employer will make a matching contribution on workers’ retirement savings, up to a cap. Advisors often refer to a match as free money.

For example, if a worker contributes 3% or more of their annual salary to a 401(k) plan, the employer might add another 3% to the worker’s account.

In this example — a dollar-for-dollar match up to 3% — the investor would be doubling their money, the equivalent of a 100% profit.

A match is “one of the rare guarantees on an investment that we have,” said Kamila Elliott, a certified financial planner and co-founder of Collective Wealth Partners, based in Atlanta.

“If you were in Vegas and every time you put $1 in [the slot machine] you got $2 out, you’d probably be sitting at that slot machine for a mighty long time,” said Elliott, a member of CNBC’s Advisor Council.

However, that money can come with certain requirements like a minimum worker tenure, more formally known as a “vesting” schedule.

About 80% of 401(k) plans offer a matching contribution, according to a 2023 survey by the Plan Sponsor Council of America.

Employers can use a variety of formulas that determine what their respective workers will receive.

The most common formula is a 50-cent match for every dollar a worker contributes, up to 6%, according to the PSCA. In other words, a worker who saves 6% of their pay would get another 3% in the form of a company match, for a total of 9% in their 401(k).

“Where else can you get a guaranteed return of more than 50% on an investment? Nowhere,” according to Vanguard, a 401(k) administrator and money manager.

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Consider this example of the value of an employer match, from financial firm Empower: Let’s say there are two workers, each with a $65,000 annual salary and eligible for a dollar-for-dollar employer 401(k) match up to 5% of pay.

One contributes 2% to their 401(k), qualifying them for a partial match, while the other saves 5% and gets the full match. The former worker would have saved roughly $433,000 after 40 years. The latter would have a nest egg of about $1.1 million. (This example assumes a 6% average annual investment return.)

Financial advisors generally recommend people who have access to a 401(k) aim to save at least 15% of their annual salary, factoring in both worker and company contributions.

That so-called free money may come with some strings attached, however.

For example, so-called “vesting” requirements may mean workers have to stay at a company for a few years before the money is fully theirs.

About 60% of companies require tenure of anywhere from two to six years before they can leave the company with their full match intact, according to the PSCA. Workers who leave before that time period may forfeit some or all their match.

The remainder have “immediate” vesting, meaning there is no such limitation. The money is theirs right away.

House lawmakers in Washington are closing in on the signatures they need to force a vote on a bill to eliminate rules that reduce Social Security benefits for certain retirees who also receive pension income.

On Thursday morning, Reps. Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., and Garret Graves, R-La., marked the 206 signatures a discharge petition had thus far collected with a press conference outside the Capitol building alongside organizations representing police, firefighters, postal workers, teachers and other government employees often affected by those rules.

By Thursday afternoon, the number of signatures had climbed to 217. To force a vote on the bill, the lawmakers need 218 signatures.

The bipartisan bill — the Social Security Fairness Act — would repeal rules known as the Windfall Elimination Provision, or WEP, and the Government Pension Offset, or GPO, that currently reduce Social Security benefits for almost 3 million Americans.

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“We have taken on, on a bipartisan basis, something that’s just completely unjust, that has been going on for over four decades,” Graves said.

“This is a situation where you have some of the most important occupations, some of the most important contributors to our community, that are being discriminated against,” he said.

The Windfall Elimination Provision reduces Social Security benefits for individuals who receive pension income from public roles that did not contribute Social Security payroll taxes — but who also paid into the program and qualified for benefits through other work. The WEP affects about 2 million Social Security beneficiaries.

The Government Pension Offset, meanwhile, reduces spousal benefits for federal, state or local government employees who did not contribute to Social Security payroll taxes. The GPO affects almost 800,000 retirees.

The rules can force affected workers to make tough retirement decisions.

That includes Lois Carson, president of the Ohio Association of Public School Employees, who said during Thursday’s press conference that the rules affected the decisions she made to support her family after her husband passed away. While Carson was able to receive income from his pension, she was not able to access Social Security survivor benefits, as she and her husband both worked as public employees.

“I continue to work after 37 years, because if I retire, I’m going to lose half of my funding because of this law,” Carson said.

Carson cited a friend who lost the $1,200 monthly Social Security benefit checks she received on her husband’s record after she retired from her job as a public-school employee.

The bill to repeal the WEP and GPO rules is the “most bipartisan and co-sponsored bill in the United States Congress,” Rep. Greg Landsman, D-Ohio, said Thursday.

The House version of the bill currently has 327 co-sponsors.

If the bill is put up for a vote in the House, it may pass experts say.

However, it remains to be seen whether it would also be put up for a vote in the Senate, where the bill has 62 co-sponsors.

Time constraints may limit the effort’s progress, Emerson Sprick, associate director for the Bipartisan Policy Center’s economic policy program, recently told CNBC.com.

“Both the Senate and the House have a lot of work to do before the end of the year,” Sprick said.

While experts agree the WEP and GPO rules could be adjusted to be fairer, some say eliminating them altogether may not be the answer.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the move would cost around $196 billion over 10 years. The comes as the program already faces a trust fund shortfall, with the program’s combined funds projected to run out in 2035, when 83% of benefits will be payable.

Others have voiced concerns that repealing the rules would result more a more generous income replacement formula for workers with combined public and private work compared to others who contribute to Social Security for their entire careers.

“To the extent that people have worked both in covered and non-covered employment, in general they should be receiving some Social Security benefit,” said Paul Van de Water, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

“The question is how much,” he said.

The Federal Reserve announced Wednesday it will lower its benchmark rate by a half percentage point, or 50 basis points, paving the way for relief from the high borrowing costs that have hit consumers particularly hard. 

The federal funds rate, which is set by the U.S. central bank, is the interest rate at which banks borrow and lend to one another overnight. Although that’s not the rate consumers pay, the Fed’s moves still affect the borrowing and savings rates they see every day.

Wednesday’s cut sets the federal funds rate at a range of 4.75%-5%.

A series of interest rate hikes starting in March 2022 took the central bank’s benchmark to its highest in more than 22 years, which caused most consumer borrowing costs to skyrocket — and put many households under pressure.

Now, with inflation backing down, “there are reasons to be optimistic,” said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.com.

However, “one rate cut isn’t a panacea for borrowers grappling with high financing costs and has a minimal impact on the overall household budget,” he said. “What will be more significant is the cumulative effect of a series of interest rate cuts over time.”

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“There are always winners and losers when there is a change in interest rates,” said Stephen Foerster, professor of finance at Ivey Business School in London, Ontario. “In general, lower rates favor borrowers and hurt lenders and savers.”

“It really depends on whether you are a borrower or saver or whether you currently have locked-in borrowing or savings rates,” he said.

From credit cards and mortgage rates to auto loans and savings accounts, here’s a look at how a Fed rate cut could affect your finances in the months ahead.

Since most credit cards have a variable rate, there’s a direct connection to the Fed’s benchmark. Because of the central bank’s rate hike cycle, the average credit card rate rose from 16.34% in March 2022 to more than 20% today — near an all-time high.

Going forward, annual percentage rates will start to come down, but even then, they will only ease off extremely high levels. With only a few cuts on deck for 2024, APRs would still be around 19% in the months ahead, according to McBride.

“Interest rates took the elevator going up, but they’ll be taking the stairs coming down,” he said.

That makes paying down high-cost credit card debt a top priority since “interest rates won’t fall fast enough to bail you out of a tight situation,” McBride said. “Zero percent balance transfer offers remain a great way to turbocharge your credit card debt repayment efforts.”

Although 15- and 30-year mortgage rates are fixed, and tied to Treasury yields and the economy, anyone shopping for a new home has lost considerable purchasing power in the last two years, partly because of inflation and the Fed’s policy moves.

But rates are already significantly lower than where they were just a few months ago. Now, the average rate for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage is around 6.3%, according to Bankrate.

Jacob Channel, senior economist at LendingTree, expects mortgage rates will stay somewhere in the 6% to 6.5% range over the coming weeks, with a chance that they’ll even dip below 6%. But it’s unlikely they will return to their pandemic-era lows, he said.

“Though they are falling, mortgage rates nonetheless remain relatively high compared to where they stood through most of the last decade,” he said. “What’s more, home prices remain at or near record highs in many areas.” Despite the Fed’s move, “there are a lot of people who won’t be able to buy until the market becomes cheaper,” Channel said.

Even though auto loans are fixed, higher vehicle prices and high borrowing costs have stretched car buyers “to their financial limits,” according to Jessica Caldwell, Edmunds’ head of insights.

The average rate on a five-year new car loan is now more than 7%, up from 4% when the Fed started raising rates, according to Edmunds. However, rate cuts from the Fed will take some of the edge off the rising cost of financing a car — likely bringing rates below 7% — helped in part by competition between lenders and more incentives in the market.

“Many Americans have been holding off on making vehicle purchases in the hopes that prices and interest rates would come down, or that incentives would make a return,” Caldwell said. “A Fed rate cut wouldn’t necessarily drive all those consumers back into showrooms right away, but it would certainly help nudge holdout car buyers back into more of a spending mood.”

Federal student loan rates are also fixed, so most borrowers won’t be immediately affected by a rate cut. However, if you have a private loan, those loans may be fixed or have a variable rate tied to the Treasury bill or other rates, which means once the Fed starts cutting interest rates, the rates on those private student loans will come down over a one- or three-month period, depending on the benchmark, according to higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz. 

Eventually, borrowers with existing variable-rate private student loans may be able to refinance into a less expensive fixed-rate loan, he said. But refinancing a federal loan into a private student loan will forgo the safety nets that come with federal loans, such as deferments, forbearances, income-driven repayment and loan forgiveness and discharge options.

Additionally, extending the term of the loan means you ultimately will pay more interest on the balance.

While the central bank has no direct influence on deposit rates, the yields tend to be correlated to changes in the target federal funds rate.

As a result of Fed rate hikes, top-yielding online savings account rates have made significant moves and are now paying more than 5% — the most savers have been able to earn in nearly two decades — up from around 1% in 2022, according to Bankrate.

If you haven’t opened a high-yield savings account or locked in a certificate of deposit yet, you’ve likely already missed the rate peak, according to Matt Schulz, LendingTree’s credit analyst. However, “yields aren’t going to fall off a cliff immediately after the Fed cuts rates,” he said.

Although those rates have likely maxed out, it is still worth your time to make either of those moves now before rates fall even further, he advised.

One-year CDs are now averaging 1.78% but top-yielding CD rates pay more than 5%, according to Bankrate, as good as or better than a high-yield savings account.

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If you’ve inherited a pretax individual retirement account since 2020, you could face a sizable tax bill without proper planning, experts say. 

Previously, heirs could take inherited IRA withdrawals over their lifetime, known as the “stretch IRA.”

However, the Secure Act of 2019 enacted the “10-year rule,” which requires certain heirs, including adult children, to deplete inherited IRAs by the 10th year after the original account owner’s death.

But waiting until the 10th year to make IRA withdrawals “could mean sitting on a tax bomb,” said certified financial planner Ben Smith, founder of Cove Financial Planning in Milwaukee.    

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Pretax IRA withdrawals incur regular income taxes. The 10-year rule can mean higher yearly taxes for certain heirs, particularly for higher earners with bigger IRA balances.

Shortening the 10-year withdrawal window can compound the issue, experts say.

Larger withdrawals can significantly boost your adjusted gross income, which can have other consequences, such as higher capital gains tax rates or phaseouts for other tax benefits, Smith said.

For example, Smith has seen people lose eligibility for the electric vehicle tax credit, worth up to $7,500, by taking a large inherited IRA withdrawal in a single year.

Since 2019, there’s been confusion over whether certain heirs needed to take yearly withdrawals, known as required minimum distributions, or RMDs, during the 10-year window. 

After years of waived penalties, the IRS finalized RMD rules for inherited IRAs in July.

Starting in 2025, certain beneficiaries — heirs who are not a spouse, minor child, disabled, chronically ill or certain trusts — must begin taking yearly RMDs from inherited IRAs. The RMD rule applies if the original account owner reached their RMD age, or “required beginning date,” before death.

Starting in 2020, the Secure Act raised the required beginning date for RMDs to age 72 from 70½. But Secure 2.0 enacted two increases: RMDs beginning at age 73 starting in 2023, and age 75 in 2033.

Even if RMDs aren’t required, heirs should still consider spreading out inherited IRA withdrawals, experts say.

“If you decide not to take a distribution from an inherited IRA in a year and it continues to grow, the tax bill increases right along with it,” according to CFP Carl Holubowich, principal at Armstrong, Fleming & Moore in Washington, D.C. “That money will be taxed at some point, it’s just a matter of timing.”  

Some heirs may consider bigger inherited IRA withdrawals in lower-income years during the 10-year window or other tax-planning strategies, experts say.

Individuals may also consider future federal income tax brackets, IRA expert and certified public accountant Ed Slott previously told CNBC.

Without changes from Congress, dozens of individual tax provisions, including lower federal income tax brackets, will sunset after 2025. That would revert rates to 10%, 15%, 25%, 28%, 33%, 35% and 39.6%.

“Every year you don’t use [the lower brackets] is a wasted opportunity,” Slott said. 

But with control of the White House and Congress uncertain, it’s difficult to predict whether the federal tax brackets will change after 2025.

Planning to work longer is a popular escape hatch for Americans who feel they’ve saved too little to support themselves in old age.

About 27% of workers intend to work in retirement because they need to supplement their income, according to a new CNBC and SurveyMonkey survey. They polled 6,657 U.S. adults in early August, including 2,603 who are retired and 4,054 who are working full time or part time, are self-employed or who own a business.

While working longer is among the best ways to shore up one’s nest egg, the plan may backfire, according to retirement experts.

Workers may not be able to work into their late 60s, early 70s or later due to an unexpected health complication or a layoff, for example.

“It sounds great on paper,” said Philip Chao, a certified financial planner and founder of Experiential Wealth, based in Cabin John, Maryland. “But reality could be very different.”

If workers lose those wages, they’d have to figure out another way to make their retirement savings last.

Americans generally use a later retirement age “as an escape valve which doesn’t necessarily exist,” Chao said. “But saying it and doing it are two totally different things.”

It could ultimately be a “very dangerous” assumption, Chao said.

Many people who retired earlier than planned, 35%, did so because of a hardship, such as a health problem or disability, according to the EBRI survey. Another 31% of them retired due to “changes at their company,” such as a layoff.  

More than half, 56%, of full-time workers in their early 50s get pushed out of their jobs due to layoffs and other circumstances before they’re ready to retire, according to a 2018 Urban Institute paper. Often, such workers earn substantially less money if they ultimately find another job, the paper found.

Of course, some people exit the workforce early for positive reasons: More than a third, 35%, of people who retired earlier than anticipated did so because they could afford to, EBRI found.

Working longer — for those who can do it — is a financial boon, according to retirement experts.

For one, workers can delay drawing down their savings; that keeps their nest egg intact longer and may allow it to continue growing via investment profit and additional contributions. Workers can also delay claiming Social Security benefits, which can boost how much they receive.

Some people continue to work longer because they like it: About a quarter, 26%, of workers said they want to work in retirement, and 17% of retirees continue to work in some capacity because they enjoy it, according to the CNBC retirement survey.

Americans may also get non-financial benefits from working longer, such as improved health and longevity. However, research suggests such benefits depend on how much stress workers experience on the job, and the physical demands of their labor.

Working longer also appears to be more of a possibility for a growing share of older workers.

“A shift away from a manufacturing economy to one primarily focused on delivering services and information facilitates working to an older age,” Jeffrey Jones, a Gallup analyst, wrote.

You can start by finding your total federal taxes paid for 2023, which is listed on line 24 of your tax return. If your gross income and tax situation has not changed from last year, you are likely to owe a similar amount for 2024, Lucas explained.   

Next, you will need to review your pay stubs.

If you have paid roughly 75% of last year’s total taxes by the end of September, “you’re going to be pretty darn close, assuming everything is the same as the prior year,” he said.  

However, “there’s a whole slew of things that can change” from year to year, such as a second job, higher income, divorce, marriage or birth of a child, which makes your tax situation different, Lucas said. 

In those scenarios, you will need a more in-depth analysis to double-check your 2024 withholding, he said.    

If your tax situation changed this year, experts recommend periodically using a free tool from the IRS, known as the “tax withholding estimator.”

The tool factors in your marital status, dependents, number of jobs, other sources of income, most-recent paystub, taxes withheld, estimated tax payments and other details.  

After plugging in your information, the IRS provides a prefilled Form W-4, which you can then provide to your employer to increase or decrease your withholding.

Alternatively, you could make payments directly to the IRS to cover your 2024 tax shortfall, Lucas said.

Either way, “you’ve got to keep an eye on it,” or you could face an unexpected tax bill, along with penalties and interest, said Mark Steber, chief tax information officer at Jackson Hewitt.

If you update your tax withholding via Form W-4, you will want to make sure the change is accurate and reflected in future paychecks through the end of the year, Lucas said.

But your withholding should be temporary through 2024 and you will need to resubmit Form W-4 again in January, he warned. Otherwise, you could withhold too much for 2025. 

Open enrollment season can be a whirlwind for anyone. Being in a relationship adds an extra layer of complexity, especially when your workplace enrollment windows don’t align.

Conflicting deadlines, varying benefits options and differing risk appetites make it challenging for couples to coordinate their choices.

However, you can make sure your benefits decisions complement one another to create a full program that suits everyone’s needs. You just need to time it, talk it through, and know when to seek support. Here’s how.

The first key to navigating open enrollment together is communicating early.

Don’t wait until the last minute to discuss your benefits options. When people wait too long, they end up needing to rely on assumptions, because they can’t get the information they need in time. If one of your enrollment deadlines approaches right when the other’s enrollment window opens, reach out to the latter’s enrollment team for those options in the second window as soon as possible.

Sometimes, employers only make snapshots of plans readily accessible online, and you have to request complete copies of the plans to have all of the information. When you’re making comparisons, you want to have as many details as possible.

The good thing is, regardless of when enrollment windows open or close, you can have big-picture conversations as a couple to set the stage for informed decision-making.

Ask each other the following questions:

• Have there been any major changes in your personal or financial situations this year? (Things like, you’re planning to have a child, have surgery, purchase a home, manage a new debt, etc.)

• Do either of you have new health and wellness needs or goals to consider?

• What are your long-term financial goals, and how can your benefits help you achieve them?

By getting on the same page early, you’ll be better equipped to make thoughtful decisions around your benefits that reflect your shared priorities.

Understanding what’s available to each of you is critical to coordinating your benefits effectively. Many workplaces offer a wide array of options, from health insurance to retirement contributions, disability coverage and even wellness programs. Comparing these benefits side by side will allow you to determine which ones make the most sense for your household.

Start by getting all the relevant documents for your and your partner’s benefits offerings. This might include your benefits guide, summary plan descriptions and any other detailed documents your employers provide. Like we mentioned above, this may require you to proactively ask for more information sooner from one of your employers. Hopefully, they’ll be able to provide you something or at least address your request first when the options are finalized.

Then, create a benefits inventory by listing out the options available to both of you. Include details for: upfront costs (like deductibles), recurring costs (like payroll deductions for your health insurance premiums and retirement contributions), limits of coverage and benefits (not just dollar amounts but in- and out-of-network coverage) and how much your employers contribute to your health and retirement plans.

Sometimes, the better option is obvious. But often, you’re not making apples-to-apples comparisons, because employers and organizations have different objectives that reflect in their offerings. You need to assess them in the context of what works best for your family to find the right answer for you.

After you have gathered all your benefits information, it’s time to develop a strategy. Even if your enrollment windows are different, you should create a cohesive plan by considering both of your options together. It’s worth mentioning that some benefits, like disability insurance, are just for the individual enrollee and might not require much thinking beyond whether one partner wants to participate or not. However, other benefits such as medical, vision, dental and life insurance may offer coverage for more than one person and should be considered together.

Decide which benefits are most important to you and your partner. For many people, major medical insurance is typically the most important benefit because it offsets the risk of the highest health care costs and provides access to necessary medical care you may need throughout the year.

Make sure you are aware of your employer subsidies in play. Some employers, for example, pay for some or all of the health insurance premiums for their employees. They may or may not extend that to spousal or family coverage, though. You want to take advantage of as many employer subsidies as you can, so depending on how they break out, you and your partner might want to enroll in separate plans.

You should also consider how each of you view risk. In the context of insurance, it’s hard to conclude which options work best for you without understanding how you feel about handling certain situations when they occur.  For example, do you like having access to many medical specialists throughout the year, or do you barely go to the doctor and prefer a “wait and see” approach?

Selecting more comprehensive health insurance offsets the financial risks of medical care, but there’s an emotional component, too. Do you feel better knowing you have more coverage in the event of an emergency? That matters.

Even if you lined up everything perfectly last year, it’s critical to review your benefits every year. Lives change, jobs change, your finances change.

At least twice a year, discuss benefits in your regular money meetings as a couple. Talk about whether they feel like enough or too much, whether they’ve made cash feel tight, or any other concerns you may have about your current strategy. This way, you know whether you’re going into your next enrollment season with changes to make and can be proactive instead of reactive to get what you need.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the process, don’t hesitate to seek professional help. Financial advisors, benefits specialists, and even your human resources department can provide good insights into your options and help you make the best choices for your situation. Some advisors specialize in working with couples and can help you coordinate your benefits strategies in a way that aligns with your broader financial goals.

Coordinating open enrollment decisions as a couple can be challenging, but it can also serve as an opportunity to strengthen your partnership. By communicating openly, understanding each other’s options, and creating a shared strategy, you can make sure that your benefits work in harmony regardless of when your enrollment windows open and close.

— By Douglas and Heather Boneparth of The Joint Account, a money newsletter for couples. Douglas is a certified financial planner and the president of Bone Fide Wealth in New York City. Heather, an attorney, is the firm’s director of business and legal affairs. Douglas is also a member of the CNBC Financial Advisor Council.

Seniors looking to reduce expenses while also boosting their quality of life may find the idea of settling abroad appealing, financial experts say.

To that point, nearly one-third of retirees have relocated either domestically or outside the country after leaving the workforce, according to a new CNBC survey, which polled more than 6,600 U.S. adults in early August.

Some of the top reasons for retiree moves were a lower cost of living, a more comfortable lifestyle or better weather, the survey found.   

While many older Americans have opted for a less expensive city or state, others are choosing to spend their golden years abroad. 

More than 450,000 retirees were receiving Social Security benefits outside the U.S. as of December 2023, according to the latest Social Security Administration data. That’s up from less than 250,000 retirees in December 2003.   

“Each year, there are more and more,” said certified financial planner Leo Chubinishvili of Access Wealth in East Hanover, New Jersey. “And I think that will continue to grow.” 

Despite cooling inflation, higher costs are still prompting significant changes to retirement plans, a 2024 survey from Prudential Financial found.

Meanwhile, roughly 45% of U.S. households are predicted to fall short of money in retirement by leaving the workforce at age 65, according to a Morningstar model that analyzed spending, investing, life expectancy and other factors. 

But some retirees can stretch their nest egg by living somewhere with a lower cost of housing, health care and other expenses, depending on their needs, Chubinishvili said.

Some retirees are also motivated to move abroad for the “cultural exchange,” said CFP Jane Mepham, founder of Austin, Texas-based Elgon Financial Advisors, where she specializes in international planning.  

“There’s a sense of adventure,” she said. “People really want to travel.”

However, retiring overseas does require advance planning. For example, you’ll need to understand visa and residency requirements, local laws, international taxes and other logistics.

Plus, you’ll need to research whether you can get into your new country’s health system or whether you’ll need to purchase private insurance. Medicare won’t cover you abroad, Mepham said.

“For many people, [living abroad] could be a money-saving option, depending on how they want to live their lives,” said CFP Jude Boudreaux, partner and senior financial planner with The Planning Center in New Orleans, who works with several expat clients.

But other factors, such as proximity to aging parents or grandchildren, can weigh heavily on the decision, said Boudreaux, who is also a member of CNBC’s Financial Advisor Council.

To that point, of retirees who moved, some 36% wanted to be closer to family, only slightly lower than the 37% seeking a lower cost of living, according to the CNBC survey.

But your retirement, including a choice to live abroad, could change later, depending on your circumstances, he said.

“Everybody makes decisions based on their life priorities,” Boudreaux said. “Being clear about that helps people make good choices.”

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Molly Richardson, 35, regularly contributes to her 401(k) plan, but the structural engineer said she isn’t too worried about retirement yet.

“It’s always something I felt like I could wait until I’m 50 to figure out,” she said.

Like many other working adults, Richardson has more pressing expenses for now, she said, such as the mortgage on her home in Jacksonville, Florida, car loans and student debt.

Still, the married mother of one admits she doesn’t have a clear savings goal once those other financial obstacles are out of the way.

“It’s hard to estimate how much we are actually going to need,” she said. “There are question marks.”

In fact, 4 in 10 American workers — 40% — are behind on retirement planning and savings, largely due to debt, insufficient income or getting a late start, according to a new CNBC survey, which polled more than 6,600 U.S. adults in early August.

Older generations closer to retirement age are more likely to regret not saving for retirement early enough, the survey found: 37% of baby boomers between ages 60 and 78 said they felt behind, compared with 26% of Gen Xers, 13% of millennials, and only 5% of Gen Zers over the age of 18.

“There are so many individuals, young, mid-career and deep into their career, that are not saving enough for a healthy and secure retirement,” said Jacqueline Reeves, the director of retirement plan services at Bryn Mawr Capital Management.

By some measures, retirement savers, overall, are doing well.

As of the second quarter of 2024, 401(k) and individual retirement account balances notched the third-highest averages on record and the number of 401(k) millionaires hit an all-time high, helped by better savings behaviors and positive market conditions, according to the latest data from Fidelity Investments, the nation’s largest provider of 401(k) savings plans.

The average 401(k) contribution rate, including employer and employee contributions, now stands at 14.2%, just below Fidelity’s suggested savings rate of 15%.

And yet, there is still a gap between what savers are putting away and what they will need once they retire.

Although many employees with a workplace plan contribute just enough to take advantage of an employer match, “9% [considering a typical 5% savings rate and 4% match], mathematically speaking, will not provide enough in that piggy bank,” Reeves said.

“They call it a ‘standard safe harbor match’ for a reason,” she added. “Further in our career, we should be saving 15% to 20%.”

“I don’t think you ever feel completely caught up,” said Lisa Cutter, 56, of Terre Haute, Indiana.

Cutter, who works as an administrator in higher education, explained that it took a while before she could put anything at all toward long-term savings.

“When I first entered the workforce, I was a classroom teacher and I had no money; I was broke,” Cutter said.

Now Cutter, who is a single mom, has to prioritize her savings. She relies on the retirement tools and calculators that come with her employer-sponsored plan to stay on track.

“I would probably like to retire around 67,” she said.

Other reports show that a retirement savings shortfall is weighing heavily on Americans as they approach retirement age.

LiveCareer’s retirement fears survey found that 82% of workers have considered delaying their retirement due to financial reasons, while 92% fear they may need to work longer than originally planned. 

Roughly half of Americans worry that they’ll run out of money when they’re no longer earning a paycheck — and 70% of retirees wish they had started saving earlier, according to another study by Pew Charitable Trusts.

And among middle-class households, only 1 in 5 are very confident they will be able to fully retire with a comfortable lifestyle, according to a recent Retirement Outlook of the American Middle Class report by Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies. The middle class is broadly defined as those with an annual household income between $50,000 and $199,999.

“America’s middle class is navigating the turbulent post-pandemic economy and high rates of inflation,” said Catherine Collinson, CEO and president of Transamerica Institute. “They are focused on their health and financial well-being, but many are at risk of not achieving a financially secure retirement.”

“If you do less at 30, you’ll still have more at 60 than if you did more at 50,” said Bryn Mawr’s Reeves.

More than any other money misstep, not saving for retirement early enough is the biggest financial regret for 22% of Americans, according to another report by Bankrate. 

But there’s no easy way to make up for lost time.

“Inflation and high prices are cited as the biggest obstacle to progress in addressing our financial regrets,” said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.com. “Don’t expect an overnight fix.”

There are, however, habits that can help.

Saving for retirement can be “automated through payroll deduction, direct deposit and automatic transfers,” McBride said. “Start modestly and after a couple of pay periods, you won’t miss what you don’t see.”

In addition to automatic deferrals, Reeves recommends opting in to an auto-escalation feature, if your company offers it, which will automatically boost your savings rate by 1% or 2% each year.

Savers closer to retirement can even turbocharge their nest egg.

“Everybody hits 50 and is like, ‘wait a minute,'” Reeves said, so “there are other opportunities layered on, because many people are caught at that juncture.”

Currently, “catch-up contributions” allow savers 50 and older to funnel an extra $7,500 into 401(k) plans and other retirement plans beyond the $23,000 employee deferral limit for 2024.

It’s also important to create a separate savings account for emergency money, Collinson advised, “which will help you avoid tapping into your retirement account when disaster strikes.”

Similarly, make sure you are properly insured and employable by staying up to date on the latest technology and training, she added, to avoid potential income disruptions.

“The single most important ingredient is access to meaningful employment throughout your working years,” Collinson said.

Most experts recommend meeting with a financial advisor to shore up a long-term plan. There’s also free help available through the National Foundation for Credit Counseling.  

REGISTER NOW! Join the free, virtual CNBC’s Women and Wealth event on Sept. 25 to hear from financial experts who will help fund your future — whether you are returning to the workforce, starting a new career or just looking to improve your relationship with money. Register here.

Tax breaks worth trillions of dollars are scheduled to expire after 2025 without extension from Congress — including a hefty deduction for millions of self-employed filers and business owners.  

Enacted by former President Donald Trump, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 created the qualified business income deduction, or QBI, which is worth up to 20% of eligible revenue, subject to limitations.

The temporary deduction applies to so-called pass-through businesses, which report income at the individual level, such as sole proprietors, partnerships and S-corporations, along with some trusts and estates. 

“The hope is that this gets extended because it’s going to be very disruptive for a lot of business owners” if the tax break is allowed to expire, said Dan Ryan, a tax partner at law firm Sullivan and Worcester.

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Lawmakers added the temporary QBI deduction to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act to create tax rates for pass-through businesses that are similar to tax rates for corporations.

But while the QBI deduction will sunset after 2025, the legislation permanently reduced corporate taxes by dropping the top federal rate from 35% to 21%.

For tax year 2021, the most recent data available, there were roughly 25.9 million QBI claims, up from 18.7 million in 2018, the first year the tax break was available, according to the IRS. 

“It’s something that is very important to a lot of privately held businesses,” said Howard Gleckman, senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.

As the 2025 tax cliff approaches, there have been “very strong feelings” about whether to extend the QBI deduction, according to Garrett Watson, senior policy analyst and modeling manager at the Tax Foundation.  

Business advocates say the deduction promotes growth and have pushed to make the tax break permanent. Meanwhile, some policy experts and lawmakers point to the high cost and the deduction’s complexity.

The QBI deduction is “fairly pricey,” with an estimated 10-year cost of more than $700 billion, Watson said. That could pose a challenge amid debate over the federal budget deficit.

Other critics say the QBI deduction primarily benefits the wealthy because higher earners are more likely to have pass-through income. However, there are millions of middle-income taxpayers also claiming the deduction, according to IRS data.

Watson said some Democrats are eager to see the tax break expire, “but that runs right into the president’s tax pledge.”

White House National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard in June reaffirmed President Joe Biden’s promise to extend Trump’s tax breaks only for those making less than $400,000.