Wasn’t it Albert Einstein who said compound interest was the eighth wonder of the world? I completely agree with you, starting as early as possible is key. In the UK, we have a State Pension which is somewhat similar to US Social Security, although everyone who pays in for 35 years gets a full pension and it does, for example, give credits to a parent who is not working whilst taking care of children. However, we recently also followed Australia in introducing a workplace pension where all employers who did not already have a scheme were required to start contributing to a low cost scheme for all employees (who were auto enrolled, although they could opt out) and the employees contribute too. The scheme is, so far, looking successful and fewer employees are opting out than feared. It is by no means perfect but it looks helpful and a step in the right direction.