You might have heard the latest donning of sackcloth and ashes over the country’s poor savings rate.

The latest survey from the Retirement Commissioner shows fewer people are saving than they were when the commissions did its first survey four years’ ago.

The survey showed only 49% of adults are now “saving regularly”, a drop from the 53% in the 2005 survey.

But you can file this under “so what?” for two reasons.

The original table accompanying the story "Negative real interest rates sabotage savers" omitted the pension (NZ Superannuation) from the net income figures. A revised table includes the omitted figures, and we apologise for the errors.

Retirement will have to be put on the backburner for some older workers who lost money this year, says Retirement Commissioner Diana Crossan.

She says that many who planned to retire within the next year have lost 20-30% or more of their retirement funds in the sharemarket, leaving them with tough choices to make.

They will either have to keep working for a couple more years, sell some of their assets to raise cash or accept a reduced standard of living in retirement, which Ms Crossan says those accustomed to wealthy lifestyles will probably baulk at.