Gloomy Friday:

I looked at our retirement plans today and wished I hadn't. Our 401K's have more than halved. People tell us that we're young. we till have the next 20-30 more years to work and save. But my whole being revolts at the lost savings. Not the money that we made on top, just the money we actually invested. Our hard earned money. I'm ready to cry now. Plan for the future : Let the stock market go back up. When it does and we make our money back, move it into Stable value funds. Yes they don't make much but atleast our funding remains safe. Given that we have the next 20 -30 work years left I can totally imagine another economic downturn or two. From now one I'm sticking our greens in CD's, stable funds and real estate. Some days I feel trapped and frustated. We invested our money wisely, now that the economy is down and the possibilty arises that we made need it, it's gone. So living frugally makes no sense. Because right now with all the bailouts the government is planning on taxing me more to save the very companies which lost my earnings. So I don't get it. Yes the argument is that it will keep jobs in the country, and I'm all for it, but how are the companies paying for their own lack of foresight. The CEO's and the financial teams that make the giant pays and have the home in Lake Forest and Winnetka... who have lost my hard earned money, how are they affected by this. When I first started working in america, everyone told me how important it was to save for retirement. I had not even turned 30 and there was all this talk of how we had to save when we were young for when we were old. And I bought into it. What a crock. I'm not a spendthrift by any means, I do save my money. But I was used to saving it in CD's or savings accounts. I didn't understand 401 K's and stock plans. I read as much as I could on it and tried my best to do my homework. All articles said invest instocks if you're young, and stables if your older... Now I regret it. We no longer not have our retirement money, but we don't even have the memories of the fun times if we had spent our money and travelled.