{"id":721,"date":"2012-04-20T17:15:49","date_gmt":"2012-04-20T17:15:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/?p=721"},"modified":"2012-05-26T11:49:49","modified_gmt":"2012-05-26T11:49:49","slug":"why-latinos-arent-saving-for-retirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/?p=721","title":{"rendered":"WHY LATINOS AREN&#8217;T SAVING FOR RETIREMENT"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/kerryhannon\/2012\/02\/14\/why-latinos-arent-saving-for-retirement\/\"><br \/>\nRead Published Article<\/a><\/p>\n<p>When it comes to retirement savings, Latinos are failing.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s what a new survey rolled out about a week ago by ING\u00a0Retirement\u00a0Research Institute reveals. In many ways, it echoes what has been laid out in previous minority retirement studies.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Bear with me now while I bury you with a lot of statistics. There is a method to my madness. I think these reports paint an ominous picture about cultural barriers to saving for<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"1087\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/?attachment_id=1087\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?fit=300%2C300&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"300,300\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"forbes\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?fit=300%2C300&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-1087\" title=\"forbes\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?resize=150%2C150&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?resize=150%2C150&amp;ssl=1 150w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?w=300&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>retirement and will have far-reaching repercussions down the road. If you think we have a \u201cretirement\u201d crisis now, hold on to your hats.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<aside data-position=\"4\">\n<div><strong>Here are some of the ING report\u2019s findings:<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>While all populations found retirement planning to be an overwhelming task, Hispanics felt the least prepared. A hefty 54 percent say they felt \u201cnot very\u201d or \u201cnot at all\u201d prepared. This compares with 50 percent of African-Americans, 48 percent of white and 44 percent of Asian respondents who said they did not feel prepared.<\/li>\n<li>And 18 percent say they\u2019re still on the sidelines and have not started saving for retirement.<\/li>\n<li>Hispanics reported the lowest average balances\u2013$54,000\u2013in their retirement plans, considerably less than the average balance across all groups \u2013$69,000. In contrast, Asian respondents reported having the highest average plan balances \u2013$81,000.<\/li>\n<li>A shocking 19 percent are contributing less than $50 of their pay check per pay period to their employer-sponsored retirement plan, compared to 13 percent overall.<\/li>\n<li>More than half are not currently saving for retirement in a savings vehicle outside of a current employer-sponsored retirement plan such as an IRA, Roth IRA, CD, etc., compared to 42 percent overall.<\/li>\n<li>The researchers found that 57 percent of Hispanics have never calculated how much money they\u2019ll need to continue their current lifestyle, and 70 percent do not have a formal investment plan to reach their\u00a0retirement goals.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Findings for the \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/ing.us\/about-ing\/newsroom\/media-kits\/retirement-revealed-study\">Retirement Revealed\u201d<\/a>\u00a0study came from an online survey conducted last October by ORC\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/international\/\">International<\/a>. Respondents were 4,050 adults (including 500 African-Americans, 500 Hispanics and 350 Asians) between the ages of 25 and 69 who were employed full-time with annual household income of $40,000 or more.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The growing pile of minority retirement polls unveil a bleak financial landscape for many Hispanics.<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A majority of Latinos believe that the economic downturn that began in 2007 has been harder on them than on other groups in America, according to the Pew Hispanic Center\u2019s<a href=\"http:\/\/www.pewhispanic.org\/2012\/01\/26\/hispanics-say-they-have-the-worst-of-a-bad-economy\/\">report<\/a>\u00a0in January. Two-thirds say their personal finances are in \u201conly fair\u201d or \u201cpoor\u201d shape and about a third of Latino homeowners say they are underwater on their mortgage.<\/li>\n<li>Latinos, who make up 16% of the population of the United States, have long trailed other Americans on most measures of economic well-being, but analyses of recent government trend data indicate that the gaps have widened since 2005, a period that encompasses the housing market crash and the Great Recession.<\/li>\n<li>From 2005 to 2009, median household wealth (all assets minus all debt) among Latinos fell by 66 percent, compared with a drop of 53 percent among blacks and 16 percent among whites, according to the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.pewsocialtrends.org\/2011\/07\/26\/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics\/\">Pew Research Center<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>According to a<a href=\"http:\/\/www.pewsocialtrends.org\/2011\/07\/26\/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics\/\">\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0released last summer by the Center, a tiny 10 percent of the nation\u2019s 50.5 million Hispanics have individual retirement, or Keogh, accounts. That\u2019s compared to 35 percent of non-Hispanic whites.<\/li>\n<li>And about one in four Latinos have 401(k), or thrift accounts, compared to 45 percent of non-Hispanic whites.<\/li>\n<li>The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the unemployment rate among Latinos in December 2011 was 11 percent, up from 6.3 percent at the start of the Great Recession in December 2007. Over the same period, the national unemployment rate increased from 5 percent to 8.<\/li>\n<li>Michael A. Fletcher\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/places\/dc\/washington\/\">Washington<\/a>\u00a0Post article\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/national\/blacks-hispanics-hold-few-investments-poll-shows\/2011\/02\/21\/ABiNEZQ_story.html\">here,<\/a>\u00a0outlines the results of\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-srv\/nation\/special\/documents\/post-kaiser-harvard-race-recession-poll.html\">a joint Washington Post- Kaiser Family Foundation \u2013 Harvard University Poll<\/a>\u00a0that came out last February. It showed that just one in six Hispanics own stocks, bonds or mutual funds compared to about half of white workers.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For me, this is eye-opening. I confess to my na\u00efvet\u00e9. I write about retirement, but have never fully focused on the cultural differences when it comes to financial fitness. When you zoom in on this particular segment of the population that\u2019s expected to nearly double by 2050, the lack of savings is scary.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why don\u2019t Latinos save more?<\/strong>\u00a0You might surmise, perhaps, that they don\u2019t tend to work in jobs that pay as much as other ethnic groups, so they can\u2019t afford to, or may not have access to an employer\u2019s retirement plan. Those are plausible, but generalizations. The ING survey found that about a third of\u00a0Hispanics blamed insufficient income. More than one-quarter cited a \u00a0high level of debt, followed by a lack of knowledge about what their options are as their biggest barriers to saving.<\/p>\n<p>But it\u2019s just not that simple. As you get higher up that wage scale, you\u2019re still seeing a lack of retirement savings according to a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.arielinvestments.com\/content\/view\/1223\/1173\/\">retirement savings survey<\/a>across different minority groups that was released in 2009 by the Ariel<a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/education\/\">Education<\/a>\u00a0Initiative, the non-profit arm of money management firm Ariel Investments, in conjunction with Hewitt Associates.<\/p>\n<p>Even at the highest salary level of $120,000 or above, Hispanics had the least amount saved for retirement\u2013$150,000, compared with $155,000 for African-Americans, $161,000 for whites. Asians had saved the most\u2013 $223,000.<\/p>\n<p>That report I\u2019m told is the largest, most comprehensive examination of 401(k) saving and investing behaviors of African-American, Hispanic, Asian and white employees. It analyzed 401(k) information for nearly 3 million employees across 57 large, primarily FORTUNE 500 companies in the U.S.<\/p>\n<p><strong>There are more cultural issues at play.\u00a0<\/strong>Based on my reporting, for some Hispanic workers language barriers and a lack of Spanish-speaking financial advisers contribute to the problem.\u00a0For many, it\u2019s cultural. \u201cIn the Hispanic community, parents will sacrifice their own financial future in order for their children to advance,\u201d Fabian Gonzalez, vice president of multicultural sales at ING U.S., says.<\/p>\n<p>In Latino culture, it\u2019s not unusual for funds that could be \u201d investment\u201d dollars to be put to use supporting immediate and extended family and friends.\u00a0It\u2019s common to take care of aging parents or contribute to child\u2019s education before saving for one\u2019s own retirement.\u00a0And in fact, ING found that\u00a063 percent of those surveyed have dependents compared to 54 percent overall.\u00a0Plus, a lot of Hispanics send money away to their countries of origin to help out other family members there, as well.<\/p>\n<p><strong>To boost individual retirement savings, let\u2019s start by ramping up financial education.\u00a0<\/strong>The demand is there. Across all groups, there\u2019s a feeling that employers could do more\u00a0to help educate them about their retirement goals, according to the latest ING survey. In fact, a sizable 57 percent of Hispanics expect their employer to do more to educate them about retirement options compared to 47 percent overall.<\/p>\n<p><strong>A glass half-full.\u00a0<\/strong>This is one finding that made me smile\u2013probably because I can relate as an optimist at heart. Latinos are more upbeat than others about the prospect for better days ahead\u2014both for themselves and their families in the short term and for their children over the long haul, according to Pew\u2019s January report.<\/p>\n<p>Fully two-thirds, 67 percent of Latinos say they expect their financial situation to improve over the next year, compared with 58 percent of the general population who say the same. Also, two-thirds of Latinos say they expect their children to eventually enjoy a standard of living that is better than theirs is now. By contrast, less than half of the general public says the same.<\/p>\n<p>Espero que tengas buena suerta. (<em>I wish you the best of luck<\/em>.)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<aside data-position=\"4\"> <\/aside>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>This article stems from research conducted as part of a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/companies\/metlife\/\">MetLife<\/a>\u00a0Foundation Journalists in Aging Fellowship program created by New America Media and the Gerontological Society of America.<\/em><\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - http:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"http:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-small.png?w=640&#038;ssl=1\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top:5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"StumbleUpon\",\"Digg\",\"Reddit\",\"Bebo\",\"Delicious\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"small\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"WHY LATINOS AREN&#039;T SAVING FOR RETIREMENT\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Read Published Article When it comes to retirement savings, Latinos are failing. That\u2019s what a new survey rolled out about a week ago by ING\u00a0Retirement\u00a0Research Institute reveals. In many ways, it echoes what has been laid out in previous minority retirement studies.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - http:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"http:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-small.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top:5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"StumbleUpon\",\"Digg\",\"Reddit\",\"Bebo\",\"Delicious\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"small\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"WHY LATINOS AREN&#039;T SAVING FOR RETIREMENT\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1087,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[31,6,16],"tags":[333],"class_list":["post-721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-saving-for-retirement","category-second-verse-blog-on-forbes-com","category-working-after-retirement","tag-retirement"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/kerryhannon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/forbes1.gif?fit=300%2C300&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3YFQS-bD","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=721"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1421,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721\/revisions\/1421"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kerryhannon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}