Has the 401k harmed the ecomomy?

Question

The majority of working Americans are elligible to invest a percentage of their income into a 401. Once this money is invested by the worker it is controlled by a fund manager who does their best to bring the highest return possible on the investment.

But does the 401k actually help or hurt the ecomomy? Were investors in times before the 401 more apt to ride out down-times corporations had, instead of immediately moving their money like we do today? Has this investment tool caused us to turn a blind eye to corporate greed? Did the 401 cause the dot.com boom and bust, has it enabled oil companies to show the record profits in recent years? Will history show the 401 as a great investment tool, or something that cost millions of jobs, and harmed the ecomomy?

Answer 1

I think that the 401K has added a lot of value to the stock market, but it is also a little scary when so many Americans are counting on the market. I also think "day traders" are much more damaging to the market. the recent rise in oil price for no relevant reason is a good example.

Answer 2

No, the 401(k) has not harmed the economy. In fact, it has provided many people with a significant retirement income that they probably would not have otherwise done on their own. Further, the 401(k) makes a social security income go a lot further.

Answer 3

saving is not bad, a 401k is not bad.

what is bad is the 'fed' who prints money and creates debt beyond americas production and service growth.

a few thousand trillion of liquidity floating around the planet created by nothing more valid than a international bankers passing thought.

Seriously, think of your 401k if we eliminated the 'fed', and only congress could coin money, and if we did not have a $10,000,000,000,000.00 national debt, and if the market in america was truly free.

Answer 4

Do not use the link from coopern

It will attempt to  run some sort of software. The same link is posted by someone else on another question.