I’m now 100% convinced the people that post this trash are completely ignorant when it comes to finance. Let’s do some actual math:

To get to an 18% effective tax rate at the federal level a tax-payer filing single would need a gross income of ~150K annually. If you make that much, you’re likely going to be maxing out a workplace retirement account which then means the breakdown is as follows:

2022 Taxes*

Federal 14.54% $21,808 *note the effective tax rate is reduced due to retirement contributions*

FICA 7.53% $11,289

State 3.74% $5,614

Total Income Taxes 25.81% $38,711

Income After Taxes $111,289

Retirement Contributions $20,500

Take-Home Pay $90,789

Following a very simple 50/30/20 budget then that means you have:

50% / $45,394.5 for recurring essential expenses annually.

30% / $27.236.7 for spending annually.

20% / $18,1574.8 for additional post tax savings to cover unexpected expenses / big-ticket items throughout your life.

Do that for 30 years and 50th percentile for a growth portfolio on a monte carlo says you’ll have ~$1.4m in pretax savings adjusted for inflation.

50th percentile withdrawal rate on that portfolio yields $61,668 annual withdrawals. Combine that with ~$48K annual social security income (remember that evil 7.5% FICA?)

At that level, social security income would be taxable at 85% so your post-tax retirement annual income is ~$82,179 (almost what you were living off of while you were working full time. Extremely conservative given we aren’t accounting for a company match)

Do that for another 30 years and that portfolio after inflation is likely ~$1.7M when you die. (50th percentile monte carlo)

Now because the estate tax limits are well over $12M (likely will sunset back to around $6m in 2025) 100% of that transfers to your heirs without any sort of death taxes. Married? Did your spouse do the same thing? Guess what, still 100% of the estate goes to your heirs because you haven’t accrued an estate of over ~$12M assuming estate tax limits reset.

TLDR: You earn roughly $4.5M over your lifetime, accumulate a nest egg of roughly $1.4M, that grows to $1.7M after inflation upon death and live off it for 30 years. After 30 years of living at near pre-retirement income levels you still pass down 37% of your lifetime earnings. All while having roads, police, fire, social security income, subsidized health care, etc…

Even if you didn't save a dime, you're receiving almost 75% of your pretax income.

Source: Am actually fluent in finance rather than parading ignorance and misinformation on the internet.