I could be mistaken are funds going into a Roth IRA after tax where a normal 401k is pre-tax dollars, both allow investments to be tax free, the Roth allows withdrawals that are tax free in the future, where as a normal 401k you get taxed on withdrawal.
I was a contract IT worker for nearly 20 years, at each staffing company I worked for they offered some type of matching funds for anything I contributed to my 401K, I always contributed the max and got the company’s max matching number.
The point of my original post was to say, no matter what retirement investment strategy you use, assuming you don’t have a generous pension, it’s going to be taxed and generally you can’t avoid social security.
Plus, I’ve never understood gold or precious metals as an alternative to fiat money, IMO, precious metals are only good if fiat currency exists.
A roth IRA is after tax money. you initially invest less per dollar earned but.... it is not regulated how you take it out. look at tax brackets. if I take out 20 of an 401K im taxed 12% (?) if I take out 80k Im taxed 20% on everything above 20k. if I take out 100k from a roth its not taxed at all. but remember My roth dollars were less then my 401k because they were post earnings tax dollars vs pretax earnings dollars