<prompt> Human: A big selling point for the Roth IRA is that growth doesnt get taxed, but since the pre-growth amount gets taxed it seems like you end up with the same amount out anyway - except for the question of whether your tax bracket is higher now or after you get old. Calculating how much money you have when you withdraw you have: traditional:money-available pre-tax-income 1 geometric-mean-growthyears 1 -- retirement-tax-rateroth:money-available pre-tax-income 1 -- current-highest-tax-rate 1 geometric-mean-growthyears assuming your taxes now and when you retire are exactly equal, theres no difference between these 2 calculations other than where the hidden costs are. assuming a more traditional career path, your highest tax bracket now is going to be higher than your overall tax bracket when your retirement vehicles are your only source of income - and the traditional IRA is the best choice in this caseFinally, assuming a I wont retire career path you start withdrawing the funds while still working and making as much as you did when contributing - and go through a significant chunk of your investments before actually - and the Roth results in reduced taxes overallmy conclusion is that the only reason to ever do ROTH is if you plan to keep working into your late 70s and have some way to prevent anyone from making you retire. Or you quit your job with a large severance or other windfall or decide to decimate your emergency fund and spend the following few years in tahiti while doing aggressive conversions while keeping your income low enough to stay in the minimum tax bracketWheres the flaw in my logic?Edit: TLDR Since taxes while working are necessarily higher 35 than taxes when not working 15 Roth is a bad idea for most peopleEdit2: Hold on since traditional IRA withdrawals count as income theres a certain point where that affects capital gains taxes for your non-retirement accounts - is that the big reason then? Planning to live off so much capital gains money that the difference in your non-retirement capital gains tax makes up the difference?  <response>: Roths give you flexibility. Want to buy a summer cabin or RV for cash? Pulling the funds out of a 401k or traditional IRA during retirement gives you a big tax bill that year. You can use a Roth to meet those spikes in cash needs while keeping your marginal tax bracket lower.I question your presumption that your post-retirement marginal tax bracket will be 20 lower. I fully expect my retirement withdrawals plus passive income to keep me in the 22-24 federal tax bracket 77k - 315k after deductions. 