Comment by bikelang

I would really recommend playing around with Canadian specific financial planning and retirement calculators. Maybe the Canadian system is totally fucked - I don’t know. But your inclinations are a very common misconception about 401k’s in the US and I suspect this holds true in Canada too.

A few things to note:

* In the US at least - you invest your 401k in whatever funds you want. Mine are a mix of S&P500 and Total Market.

* 7-8% is the average inflation-adjusted return of the S&P500 over its history and is general figure you’ll see used in retirement planning discussions

There’s a huge wealth of resources out there on this topic. Look up Canadian specific “FIRE” guidance (Financially Independent Retired Early). I don’t know enough (or anything!) about Canada to really engage on this - but I’ve done pretty extensive planning both myself and with my financial advisor on my own early retirement objectives. For me - the math massively works out in favor of a 401k over non-tax advantaged accounts. I personally have a mix of Traditional (pre-tax), ROTH (post-tax), and non-tax advantaged accounts (because I save more than I am allowed to stuff into tax advantaged accounts per year).