Most of their contributions came from those first few years — it was something like 33% of a maximum employee contribution of 15%.

So, for simplicity sake, if I was making $100k (I wasn’t) and contributing the max allowed (by the employer and the government, actually), $15k, the company would kick in another $5k. That’s a pretty sweet deal.

In theory, after just 4 years, I could have had a growing nest egg of over $80k — $20k of which would have come as a freebie from my employer.

But more realistically, yeah, $1000 per year is right about where I’d expect most folks who still receive a match are receiving as a “benefit”. Think about it — 3% of a $50k salary is a mere $1500 over the span of an entire year. Broken down, that’s just $125 per month. Yeah, it’s something, but it’s not enough to retire on — a 401k isn’t enough. And it’s not a pension.

I think that around 75% of the folks choosing not to contribute to a 401k are aware of this (and that’s why they’re not contributing) and the other 25% are just hopelessly praying that they win the lottery or something instead.

You’re right about profit sharing too, but again, these days, how many companies are profiting so much that they’re willing to share?

It’s all cyclical but I don’t see things getting as generous as they were in the late 1990′s ever again during my working career.

RE match: is $1K a year normal? I heard 3% of your salary is the average match (which, admittedly, isn’t that great), and I hear some companies also offer profit sharing, which might be another 3+%.

The basic problem is that there are too many people taking too much money out of the taxpayer pot and too few people putting too little money in.

People can rant about entitlements and what is fair and other laudable concepts all they want, but it does not alter the fact that America (along with many other countries) are living beyond their means. The only solution that has any long term sustainability is for the country to live below its means – and kill the entitilement mentality.