My son is a senior in a local Minnesota high school this year. One of his elective classes this semester is Business Management.
A recent home work assignment included questions about company employee benefits. He asked his mother for help with the health benefits questions. He asked me for help with the company 401(k) retirement plan questions.
I thought that the answers to my son’s 401(k) questions may be of interest to readers of this blog post. Maybe their high school kids or grandkids have the same homework assignments and questions.
My son’s first question was how a company 401(k) retirement plan participant gains access to information about their company 401(k) retirement plan. I told him that the best resource was the company 401(k) retirement plan web site.
Most company 401(k) retirement plan participants don’t have the time or the expertise to understand their company 401(k) retirement plan offering. For this reason seeking independent investment advice is a good idea.
I told my son that knowledge is great. But most individual investors don’t have time for investment knowledge today. A better use of an individual company retirement plan participant’s time is to build a relationship with a knowledgeable investment professional.
My son’s second question was how a company 401(k) retirement plan account could guarantee enough money for a comfortable retirement.
I told my son that the preservation and growth of an individual company retirement plan account is always up to the individual investor. No employer or mutual fund company is going to take the responsibility for your company 401(k) retirement plan account.
Most companies match the annual company 401(k) plan contributions of their employees at some level. But those companies cannot guarantee the investment results. The same can be said for the mutual funds who invest the company 401(k) account monies.
Ric Lager
Lager & Company, Inc.
