>>>>>You have to look a little deeper in to how these plans are run. The article I referenced doesn't really go into how the investments are made. Like I said earlier the "dot com" bubble nor the "great recession" had almost no effect on these plans. They do not deal in equities although there are some allowances for individuals to put small percentages of their personal accounts in Mutual funds/ETFs- at their own risk/reward. The fund itself goes for safety and a 31/2 - 4% annual return.
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>>>>31/2=15,5 over here.
>>>The keyboard I'm using doesn't have a numeric pad so I would have to type in the 3 then use numlocks and to type in ALT+171 and then take the numlock off or I guess I could use Word, type 3 1/2 and copy and paste after Word converts it 3 ½ . I'm just a little lazy in my old age and after all I am retired.
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>>Too lazy to do it the easy way? Why bother with fractions, they really are hard to type and are frequently plain wrong, like when I see "5-3/4" which I later understand should mean 5,75 - contrary to everything I learned, the minus is a plus (!). Use decimals, it's so much simpler and unambiguous.
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>That's all great - until you have no choice to use a fraction. (2/3 for examlpe)

Most of the time you do - and even then, you can use enough decimals. In Walmart, in cloth by yard department, they cut the cloth royally, ahem, imperially - you buy, say, two yards two feet of something, and then the clerk scans the barcode on the edge of the bolt, and recalculates the length into decimal yards. The gadget she uses to print the barcode for the cash register has no fractions (only fractures, if you smash it). Of course, the overeducated staff find it beneath themselves to actually calculate, they have a fairly big cheat sheet, which is a breeze. I witnessed the event when the lady there took just three minutes to find 2/3 on the sheet, just to find that it's spelt .667 and no other way. Amazed with her accomplishment, she forgot to type the 2 before the decimal point. On the house :).