this little piggy

The news is bad about the economy, worse than usual. Big banks are going under, the feds are borrowing money from other countries. Confusion for us peons, so many decisions, where to put the money? Banks, savings, stock market, FDIC, credit union, blah blah blah...

Also on the news is the timely announcement of the richest folks in America thanks to the Forbes 400 list. Thanks for that!

Part of our income goes into a 401K for retirement, but mostly because it is tax deferred. After watching it take a beating time and again, we wonder why keep putting $ into it? We dread getting the statement and seeing how much less it is this quarter than last.

A while back we took advantage of the free financial analysis offered at the bank. After going over our finances and retirement plans, we were told, "It's a good thing you have some land!" Easy for him to say, he doesn't have to pay the taxes on it. In other words, "You won't be able to live off of your retirement savings!"

So instead of putting our hard earned money into retirement plans just to watch it disappear, in addition to the traditional piggy bank, we are looking into other options:

fill a pickle jar

bury it in the yard

stuff it in the mattress

At least with these methods, we can take out the same amount as we put in, which is more than I can say for some of the official savings methods.

Any financial advisors out there? What would you do?