<prompt> Human: Ive been reading rpersonalfinance for a little while now and I constantly hear this time of year about making sure to max out a IRA. From what Ive read typical IRAs bring 1 - 5 return. Currently I max out my 401k at 6 match that my company offers. However, last year the year to date return on that account was 18. That seems like such a high return rate that it would be silly not to put as much money as I can into this account. What am I missing? Edit: Thanks guys. Lots of great information.  <response>: The rate of return you get on the investments is not at all correlated to the account type. You could have invested in the exact same things in your IRA and gotten the same return. 