I've been doing catchup amounts for a few years. I guess a Roth starting next year makes some sense, but it hurts me in the long run.

Welp. I mean, I guess it'll go into a Roth, so there's that... but I'm definitely in a higher tax bracket now that I will be in retirement.

That's where I put all of my retirement savings.

For most of us who can afford to save for retirement the primarily vehicle is a 403 B (non profit) or 401k (for profit) retirement account with matching funds from your employer. It reduces taxes now when you are making more money and gets "free" money from your employer. They budgeted it as part of your salary but some people do not put enough to take the full match amounts.

When I left teaching, I rolled my state teacher pension funds into my 403b at the nonprofit.

No reason for me to do an IRA, easier to have one account.

I even asked the financial planner.

If you start early with a Roth, then it is good to go about half and half. Defray some taxes until later and have some tax free income later as well. But, few people early in their careers can save much more than what is required for company matching.

I was 20 years into my career with everything in tax deferred because of rolling over a pension. He said, I could do an IRA to get some tax free money later but given that the overwhelming amount would be in the 403b/401k type funds it would not benefit me to put my overage above matching into a Roth. Especially since I had two kids who still had to go to college and reducing my pretax earnings would help for student loans.

I'll be 57 when the younger one graduates college -- there is not much incentive to put money in the Roth at that point.

This sucks