Using Retirement Planning Points to Memorize Pi

March 14, 2015, is Super Pi Day because 3.1415 is the number Pi out to four decimal places. It only happens once every century.

FinMason notes that Pi’s decimal places go on to infinity, and math types often compete to see how far out they can memorize the number. The investor education firm based in Boston, Massachusetts, says if you know three ages significant to retirement planning, you can memorize Pi out to 10 decimal places.

3.1415926535 is 3.1415 and:

• 92 – Kendrick Wakeman, founder of FinMason, says this is the life expectancy people should use for retirement planning purposes. They should make sure their nest egg will support them at least until this age. 
• 65 – The traditional retirement age. Wakeman says people should not expect to save much beyond this age. 
• 35 – The start of the “prime earning years.” Random saving is no longer enough. People need a clear and specific plan for achieving retirement goals.

“We hold out 35 as more of a drop-dead date for people who have not started to get serious about retirement savings already,” Wakeman tells PLANSPONSOR. “Age 35 is generally thought of as being the start of the ‘peak earnings years.’ If you sit out a year after 35 it is exponentially more damaging than sitting out a year in your early 20s. Of course, it would be our advice to start saving as early as possible.”

Wakeman adds that getting serious about retirement means more than just saving money out of your paycheck; it means having a detailed plan for retirement and a clear path for achieving that plan. “It means sitting down with a financial adviser or some sort of online tool to work out the details. Twenty-somethings can certainly benefit from such an exercise, but many 20-somethings do not have a good idea of what they want retirement to look like. This does not mean that they should put off saving for retirement if they are younger than 35—they should start saving right from the get-go. It just means that the cost associated with not having a detailed plan skyrockets after 35.”

More information about FinMason and an infographic about Super Pi Day is available on its website.