22% of Americans name not saving for retirement early enough as their
single biggest financial regret — a figure that has topped Bankrate’s
annual survey for six of the past seven years. Among those already
enrolled in a workplace plan, the Nationwide Retirement Institute found
that 85% of respondents over 45 wish they had started contributing sooner.
On the action side, peer-reviewed RAND American Life Panel data from
Börsch-Supan and colleagues found that only 2% of adults aged 60 to 79
wish they had saved less over their lifetime. The asymmetry is stark and
consistent across methodologies: almost nobody regrets the sacrifice of
early saving, but a large share regrets the delay.
The mechanism is compound interest, which is indifferent to feelings
about youth and freedom. A dollar invested at 25 does roughly four times
the work of a dollar invested at 45, assuming a 7% real return. Gen X
respondents in the CFP Board’s 2025 survey reported a median estimated
lifetime cost of their financial mistakes at nearly $100,000, with 13%
putting the figure above $500,000. The regret is not abstract — it
translates into delayed retirement (31%), reduced ability to save or
invest further (28%), and stress levels that 59% of Gen X respondents
described as significant. Younger cohorts appear to be internalizing the
lesson: Gen Z and Millennial savers are starting contributions at ages
23 to 28, roughly a decade earlier than Gen X and Boomers did.
The main caveat is framing. Bankrate’s 22% captures only the single
worst regret — a high bar that understates the total prevalence of
retirement-timing regret. Nationwide’s 85% casts a wider net but surveys
only people already in a plan, missing those who never enrolled at all.
The 2% action-regret figure from the RAND panel is the most
methodologically rigorous number in the set, but it covers only
survivors aged 60 to 79 — people who made it that far with enough
cognitive health to answer a survey. The directional finding is
unambiguous: inaction regret dominates, and it does not fade with age.
Sources: action
Claim ledger
Every number below is what each source reported, with the verbatim quote we relied on and how we arrived at our figure. Click any link to verify directly.
[1]Journal of Economic Psychology (Börsch-Supan et al.) — Saving Regret and Procrastination↗ 2 other entries
Peer-reviewed
Only 1.7% of adults aged 60–79 wished they had saved less over their lifetime
Excerpt
“"58.5 percent of the population aged 60 to 79 wished they had saved more, about 40 percent wished they had saved the same, and only 1.7 percent wished they had saved less."
”
Source data from
2023-02-01
Accessed
2026-04-26
Calculation
Börsch-Supan, Bucher-Koenen, Hurd & Rohwedder (2023), data from the RAND American Life Panel (~6,000 respondents). The 1.7% figure represents people who actively regret having saved too much. Rounded to 2% for the regret_rate.
Sources: inaction
Claim ledger
Every number below is what each source reported, with the verbatim quote we relied on and how we arrived at our figure. Click any link to verify directly.
[1]Bankrate — More Than 1 In 5 Americans Regret Not Saving For Retirement Earlier
Reference source
22% of Americans say not saving for retirement early enough is their biggest financial regret
Excerpt
“"More than 1 in 5 Americans (22%) say their biggest financial regret is not saving for retirement early enough. Not saving for retirement early enough has been the No. 1 regret among Americans for six out of the seven years Bankrate has asked."
”
Source data from
2024-08-20
Accessed
2026-04-26
Calculation
Bankrate 2024 Financial Regrets Survey, sample of 2,355 US adults (fieldwork July 16–18, 2024). The 22% is the share citing delayed retirement savings as their single biggest financial regret — a lower bound, since it measures top-of-mind regret only.
[2]Money.com / Nationwide Retirement Institute — 85% of Gen X and Boomers Regret This Retirement Savings Mistake
Reference source
85% of respondents aged 45+ wish they had contributed to a retirement plan sooner
Excerpt
“"Some 85% of respondents 45 or older wish they had contributed to a retirement plan sooner, according to a Nationwide survey. The typical age at which Gen Xers and boomers began saving for retirement was 35."
”
Source data from
2025-09-11
Accessed
2026-04-26
Calculation
Nationwide Retirement Institute survey of 2,200 plan participants conducted by Edelman Data & Intelligence (July 30 – Aug 13, 2025). The 85% figure is among those already enrolled in a plan, so it captures intensity of regret among savers — not the general population. Used as corroboration, not as the primary rate.
Caveats
The action and inaction figures come from different surveys with different populations: the 2% action-regret rate is from a peer-reviewed study of 60–79-year-olds using RAND panel data, while the 22% inaction rate is Bankrate's general-population "biggest financial regret" measure. The 22% is a strict lower bound — it captures only those who rank delayed retirement savings as their single worst financial mistake. Nationwide's 85% figure among plan participants suggests that softer measures of regret ("wish I'd started sooner") are far higher. The 11:1 ratio should be read as directional: virtually no one regrets saving too much, while a substantial minority — and perhaps a majority — regret not starting earlier. Survivorship bias also applies: the RAND panel skews toward people who are alive and cognitively capable at 60–79, which may exclude those whose financial precarity shortened their lives. Survey data are drawn exclusively from United States samples; regret rates in countries with different retirement systems — pension entitlements, state-funded old-age support, or savings-incentive structures — may differ substantially.
