Am I alone?

Am I the only one that thinks that taking $10,000 out of your retirement account right now (as Barack Obama said this morning he wants to allow you to do without a tax penalty) is a really, really bad idea? To take out that huge chunk of money now, when your retirement account is worth less than it has been worth and (hopefully) than it will be worth relatively soon. Taking out that huge chunk of money from what you're saving for your retirement. Who's going to help you when you retire? Social Security? HA!

Am I the only one who thinks if you need $10,000 to "cover your bills" you have bigger problems than the stock market crash? Perhaps a more helpful suggestion would be to cut out expenses, rather than destroy your future? In my calculations, $10,000 taken out today to "cover your normal expenses," if left in an average 401k for the next 15 years, would become $36,425. Most people will leave that money in there if the tax penalties for withdrawing early are left in place. Even people who don't take the 30 seconds to find an online 401k calculator. I would go so far as to predict that, left alone, some people would decide to stop charging their plasma TV's to credit cards, and maybe not buy another one rather than pull money from their retirement in order to support their consumer addictions. Wouldn't that be a better idea than bleeding your retirement savings?

Don't tell me that we need people to buy plasma's on credit card in order to save the economy. Baloney. Debt is what got us into this mess. Bleeding our savings will only deepen the crisis individually and nationally.