If you were lucky. Many did not get a pension at all though. And many others had a pension that went bankrupt so they go nothing. The 1980s (starting before then) were reforms on a system that wasn't working well for many.
Unfortunately only about a third if Americans have a 401k, if we subtract those young it gets a little better (the young can pay off student loans then redirect that money to retirement, at least in theory), but still almost half of Americans don't have one.
I don't know how to find numbers, but I think that is better than pensions every were. It still isn't very good though.
You are relatively well paid. Most people in the US received total less than $500k cumulative post-tax income by 35. Median incomes don't reach that level. Here are median personal income figures over the last 17 years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...
Those are aggregated across age, and younger people tend to earn less, so the median total income working 18 to 35 will be lower than if you add up the age-independent figures. But even if that weren't true, and if people could miraculously save 100% of everything for 17 years, live on nothing but air and get totally free housing, most people still wouldn't have seen 500k by 35.
As well, necessary expenses (housing, food, transport etc) take up a higher proportion of their income than yours, because of lower income while necessary expenses don't decrease proportionately. So the proportion they can realistically save is lower than yours. For many it's a struggle to save anything, but even for those who can and are willing to sacrifice a lot, $500k by 35 is dream money.
Active fund management are not enough to make up the difference. Most people if they want $500k in a 401k by 35, have to earn significantly more than they actually do. Of course if everyone did that, prices would rise to compensate and $500k in the 401k wouldn't be worth as much.
