Yahoo Finance has an article up about the old 80% rule for retirement. The basic premise of the article is that the rule is hogwash and you don’t need that much to retire comforatably.

That’s a ridiculous figure, pulled out of thin air.

In truth, they may spend more than that in the first couple of years after they stop working, but they’re likely to spend far less, on average, over their entire retirement period. By the time they are 75, they’re likely to be spending about half of what they did when they were 50, according to the Labor Department’s survey of consumer spending.

Personally I am so far out from retirement (30 years hopefully) that its hard to predict with inflation how much I need. I would rather to save too much than too little at this point, but nice to know that 80% is not the hard and fast standard.