Households can trim their budgets, pack lunch for work and forgo vacations, yet still feel as if a comfortable retirement is slipping further out of reach. A new national survey has now pinpointed why.
The National Institute on Retirement Security (NIRS) polled 1,203 adults aged 25 and older between October and November 2025, with findings released in August 2026.
The results show that 80% of Americans now say the country faces a retirement crisis, up from 79% in 2023.
That number stood at 67% in 2020, meaning public alarm has jumped 13 points during a period of persistent inflation and rising debt. The survey also found that 61% of respondents are concerned they will not achieve financial security in retirement.
Debt is the primary obstacle between Americans and retirement savings
When asked to name the biggest reason they cannot build a nest egg, respondents pointed to debt. More than three-quarters (77%) said debt prevents them from saving adequately for retirement, according to the survey.
At the personal level, 41% cited debt repayment as the single largest barrier, followed by housing costs at 39% and emergency expenses at 30%.
Healthcare and medical bills came in fourth at 25%, creating a layered burden for households splitting limited paychecks across competing needs.
NIRS Executive Director Dan Doonan said everyday costs are directly crowding out Americans’ ability to save for retirement.
<strong>Housing, healthcare, debt, and other expenses are competing with the need to save for retirement</strong>.
Beyond debt itself, the survey identified a stack of cost pressures squeezing the same paychecks. Inflation and healthcare costs registered as concerns for 91% of respondents. Long-term care costs worried 89%, and stagnant wages concerned 88%.
That barrier stack helps explain why debt repayment consistently wins the tradeoff against retirement contributions; households are splitting limited paychecks across four simultaneous pressures.
The $1.2 million target most workers don’t expect to hit
The gap between what Americans have saved and what they believe they need makes the debt problem even more urgent for their financial future.
Workers with employer-sponsored 401(k) plans believe they need $1.2 million to retire comfortably, according to the workplace retirement plan participants surveyed as part of Schroders’ 2026 U.S. Retirement Survey of 1,500 investors.
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Yet 51% of those same plan participants expect to retire with less than $500,000 saved, including 24% who project balances below $250,000.
Only 30% believe they will cross the $1 million threshold before leaving the workforce, and 81% worry about outliving their savings.
The institute’s data reinforce that gap, with 47% of respondents reporting less than $100,000 in total retirement savings and 18% reporting nothing saved.
A financial literacy gap is making the savings shortfall worse
The NIRS report also uncovered a knowledge deficit that makes the savings problem harder for workers to navigate.
Only 9% of respondents correctly estimated the annual income that $100,000 in savings would generate, which is roughly $4,000 under standard withdrawal rules, the report showed.
That disconnect suggests millions of workers may be overestimating what their current balances will provide once monthly paychecks stop arriving.
Eric Sondergeld, managing director of Greenwald Research, warned in an interview with Plan Adviser that unrealistic savings benchmarks can backfire on workers when they feel the number is already out of reach.
Setting a specific dollar or income-multiple target actually leads to paralysis and inaction, Sondergeld said.
That pattern helps explain why the $1.2 million figure discourages the workers sitting farthest from it. The wider the gap, the less likely workers are to engage with it at all.
What the retirement survey data mean for your savings plan
The Schroders survey found 74% of plan participants call their workplace plan their single most important retirement asset. Yet 27% have cut contributions, most in the past two years.
Marshall Clay, partner and senior advisor at The Welch Group, told WAFF that the fix starts with capturing any available employer match and a guaranteed return most savers give up by default.
Beyond that, the survey’s pattern points to the next steps: automatic 1% annual escalations within the 401(k) portal to rebuild what the cuts eroded, and a separate high-yield emergency savings account to keep a car repair from pulling on the retirement balance.
Debt suppresses contributions, and a literacy gap distorts expectations. The distance between the two is where Sondergeld’s paralysis takes hold.
