Despite your best efforts to scrimp and save, chances are you really haven’t saved enough money to comfortably live our your golden years.

With volatile financial markets and quite literally a world of worries bombarding your senses, retirement planning is often not given enough thought.

Financial security expert and Entrepreneur.com contributor Pamela Yellen says many people need a complete retirement makeover.

She offered these six steps:

• "The sooner you get started the better. And don’t wait until all debt is paid off before you begin saving," Yellen said. "Putting off saving for retirement, or dealing with the inadequacies of your savings method, only makes matters worse."
• "Increase savings by one percent to two percent every year. This modest goal can help people significantly boost their long-term results without feeling a pinch," she said.
• "Realistically plan for how long you'll live. One in four people turning 65 today will live past 90, making it critical to save for the long haul."
• "Don't underestimate the impact of inflation. Even if inflation remains low for the next 30 years (it won’t), the impact can be devastating," she said.
• "Don't count on working longer to make up for your savings shortfall," she said.
• "Prioritize building an emergency fund equal to two years of household income. "
   

Meanwhile, a recent new survey of retirement confidence confirms that many workers lack realistic plans for making ends meet in retirement. It also suggests there is a disconnect between Americans' confidence about retirement and their actual preparations to ensure a comfortable one.

The Retirement Confidence Survey published by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) is the longest-running annual survey of retirement confidence among both workers and today’s retirees — this is the 26th annual edition. It provides a long view of how we are doing as a country in preparing for retirement, and this year’s survey does contain some encouraging news.

EBRI found that the percentage of workers who are confident about having enough money for a comfortable retirement has continued to recover from the record lows following the Great Recession, Reuters reported. Twenty-one percent are very confident this year, compared with 13 percent in 2013. Those who are somewhat confident rose to 42 percent, up from 38 percent in 2013.

So that means 63 percent of those surveyed have some degree of confidence. But here is the problem — many people are just guessing. Only 48 percent of workers say that they or their spouse have ever tried to calculate how much they will to have save to live comfortably in retirement.  
 
(Newsmax wire services contributed to this report).

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