Being a 401(k) millionaire matters more than ever. Here's why

Personal FinanceBeing a 401(k) millionaire matters more than ever. Here's whyIn a world where AI may reshape careers faster than ever, long-term stock market wealth may be the single strongest defense ordinary Americans have ByCatherine BaabPublished 8 hours ago|Updated 1 hour agoShare to XShare to FacebookShare to RedditShare to EmailShare to LinkGetty ImagesA version of this article originally appeared in Quartz’s members-only Markets newsletter. Quartz members get access to exclusive newsletters and more. Sign up here.Christmas arrived early this year — at least for investors. Last week, a splashy Wall Street Journal article on “moderate millionaires” laid out some striking numbers:As of the third quarter, the brokerage Fidelity reports 654,000 401(k) millionaires.The benefits provider Alight now counts about 100,000 accounts worth more than $1 million (double the 2022 total).And while T. Rowe Price doesn’t provide exact counts, roughly 2.6% of plan participants “had balances above $1 million” — again double the 2022 total.Meanwhile, WSJ reports on UBS estimates that “the number of such millionaires around the world has quadrupled since 2000 to 52 million this year. There were around a thousand of these moderate millionaires added every single day in the U.S. last year.”Chances are you know one of these millionaires — even if you aren’t one of themThe WSJ article jumped out to me, in fact, because a friend recently shared this exact milestone, texting to crow good-naturedly about her 401(k) balance breaking into seven figures for the first time. She’s a 40-something single mother with a steady corporate sales job who owns her home and has also put two kids through private schools. But she said that achieving that round figure in her 401(k) really made her feel — at last — like she’s arrived. Like she’s finally secure in a way she had never been before. How secure? Well, she told me she’s now thinking about how soon she can sell the suburban McMansion, rent an apartment in the city, and focus more on travel and exercise, especially now that her kids are leaving home. And that’s a lovely place to be — if only, for now, in mindset.There’s an emotional layer to this moment. Hitting $1 million is a financial benchmark, but it’s also proof that years of steadiness, patience, and compounding returns have finally tipped in your favor. For people like my friend, who have lived through two recessions, the pandemic, inflation, and political uncertainty — not to mention run-of-the-mill personal crises like divorce, illness, or job loss — watching an account quietly cross the seven-figure line creates a sense of relief that no salary increase ever quite delivers. It feels like safety — or maybe just the closest thing most Americans will ever experience.And clearly, my friend isn’t alone. This holiday season, hundreds of thousands of Americans are relishing the same good news, even if $1 million is hardly the vast sum it was when the term “millionaire” first gained currency in the early 20th century.Why $1 million feels different nowAs the WSJ is quick to point out, $1 million doesn’t necessarily buy a noticeably fancy lifestyle. That’s why UBS calls them “moderate millionaires” — people whose financial lives look middle class even if their balance sheets technically say otherwise. Many people who cross this line still buy used cars, worry about healthcare costs, and renovate their kitchens more modestly than their Instagram posts would have us believe. The psychological shift comes from something more basic: A $1 million account balance is finally a number that feels like it can’t be taken away overnight. The numbers back this up. A 46-year-old with $1 million invested in simple index funds has a reasonable expectation, based on the long-run average market return of about 7% annually, of doubling that balance by her late 50s, when she could begin making withdrawals if she so chooses. At 7% growth, $1 million becomes roughly $2.2 million in 12 years, even without new contributions. With typical contributions and employer matches, she could plausibly approach $2.5 or $3 million by her early 60s.At that point, the SWR — or widely recognized “safe withdrawal rate” — yields from about $100,000 to $120,000 a year in retirement income before you even start thinking about Social Security. Which, in most of the country, is a livable income. And even more crucially, it’s independent income. Not to do with wages. A divide as psychological as it is financialAnd that may be an even more crucial form of psychological security than it’s been in recent times. Retirement wealth is a form of financial security that remains intact no matter what happens to your job or your industry. And in the age of AI, that’s a massive hedge against any sense of impending personal doom — an advantage beyond any mere financial advantage. For those who aren’t sitting on record stock market wealth, things look much darker. Capturing the “k-shaped” economic divide perfectly, the WSJ published another article the very same day showing consumer sentiment near historic lows — down from 70 at the start of the year to just above 53, a level usually seen only during severe recessions. These are people who are emphatically not 401(k) millionaires, which leaves them far more exposed, mentally and financially, to the slings and arrows of, say, government shutdowns or AI revolutions. As companies from Delta to McDonald’s and Walmart noted across their Q3 earnings calls, we’re living in an economy of two psychological classes: -people whose portfolios have ballooned with the AI-driven market, and people who don’t own stocks at all.Research from JPMorgan estimates that gains in 30 top AI stocks alone added $5 trillion to household wealth in the past year, and those gains now account for about 16% of the increase in consumer spending. The top 20% of earners — who own 87% of stocks and mutual funds — are still flying business class, leasing Teslas, and jumping on rather than delaying home repairs. Every $1,000 they gain in stock market wealth has them spending as much as $50, whether they cash out those gains or not. The wealth effect provides a buffer against a labor market that feels shakier by the month.Meanwhile, everyone else is ordering a $3 Snack Wrap over a $6 Big Mac, and hoping their job still exists in Q1. Stock ownership > skills or knowledge?Here’s the part we are, for the most part, not saying out loud, but that seems to be right there between the lines: In an AI-driven labor market, the best hedge may not be reskilling. It may be owning the companies doing the displacing.The logic here is simple. If AI squeezes white-collar jobs, depresses salary growth, or removes rungs from the career ladder, wage income loses stability. In this scenario, capital income — enough tech exposure and portfolio appreciation — becomes the shock absorber.You can see this happening, with tech layoffs piling up while tech stocks soar. Gains go to shareholders, not workers. For a wage employee with no meaningful stock exposure, it’s a frightening asymmetry to say the least. But for a worker with a growing 401(k), it is — if not “fair” or necessarily a morally desirable outcome — at least a partial shield. The same forces threatening wage stability are inflating retirement accounts.Becoming a 401(k) millionaire is not a luxury milestone anymore. Increasingly, it looks like the new upper-middle-class safety line — the point where compounding finally works harder for you than the economy works against you. Achieving this in your account won’t solve inequality, but it does accomplish something personally enormous. It puts you on the benefiting side of the technological shift, not just the vulnerable one. If you’re there, you’ve reached the safety line. In a world where AI may reshape careers faster than policymakers or workers can adapt, long-term stock market wealth may be the single strongest defense ordinary Americans have. 📬 Sign up for the Daily BriefOur free, fast and fun briefing on the global economy, delivered every weekday morning.Sign me upPermanent Residency in the USGain freedom with a US Green Card by Investment: No more visa lottery. 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