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Did you know that half of all American families haven't saved for retirement? Of those who have, 25 percent have stockpiled living expenses for one year of retirement. The problem is that we have not adjusted to the changes in retirement savings since Social Security is weakening and employer-provided pensions are going away. The average Social Security benefit is $11,000/year. Very few people can live on that alone. So the bulk of retirement savings has got to come from you. Over the last year, employers gained the right to automatically enroll you in a 401(k) plan and even step up your contributions every year. Laura Tyson, the former chairwoman of the Council of Economic Advisers, recently wrote in a Wall Street Journal editorial that someone forced by their employer into a 401(k) plan will save an additional $200,000 to spend in retirement. Meanwhile, 75 million adults work for companies with no retirement plan at all. Of those millions, only one in 10 saves for retirement. But Clark thinks we need to move away from depending on the government to provide for our retirement. Congress is planning to make small employers establish an IRA auto-deduction policy for their employees. That way the employees of small businesses will automatically be saving for retirement. The bottom line is that we need to be more self-reliant. Clark believes that having the discipline to save for retirement builds the character of our country.

There's one call that Clark has taken on the air about 60 times over the years, and he's never been able to answer it convincingly: Is it worth it to pay the extra bucks to buy a hybrid just to pay less in gas every week? Now Edmunds.com has done a cost analysis of some of the top hybrid models. Their research indicates how much longer it takes to get a return on investment if you buy the hybrid versions of any cars in the study. It's the Ford Escape that gives you the quickest payback -- owners will break even at around 3 years. The Honda Civic and the Mercury Mariner tie at No. 2. The Saturn Vue checks in at No. 3, allowing owners to break even in 4.8 years. Keep in mind that any hybrid offering return on investment in under five years is a smart buy. On the other end of the spectrum, the Toyota Highlander takes 11 years before you break even and the Camry will take you 12 years. And what about the Prius? Because there's no exact gas-engine equivalent, Edmunds looked at the Prius vs. Corolla. Turns out it will take you a whopping 13.6 years to get payback if you only drive your Prius 15,000 miles/year! So Toyota -- the greenest of all the automakers -- actually does not give you good payback on your hybrid-purchasing dollar. Clark advises people to only buy a Toyota hybrid if they're doing it because of deeply held environmental beliefs.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has been front and center in Clark's mind over the whole issue of unsafe Chinese toys getting into our marketplace and harming children. This is a federal agency that's charged with seeing that dangerous products get pulled. But the CPSC really isn't doing that at all, thanks to the actions of chairwoman Nancy Nord. By law, the CPSC is prohibited from issuing public reports about unsafe items until after a multiyear investigation. Nord has been lobbying to not have additional authority to deliver reports in a quicker manner. She's also fighting a move in Congress to fine manufacturers who make unsafe products. So what gives? Clark would love for Nord to come on the show and explain her position. Perhaps she's the ultimate libertarian who believes that capitalism is the best way to deal with products that kill children. Clark is just shocked that a woman whose job it is to protect consumers is actively campaigning to undermine efforts that would allow her to do so. But Clark doesn't want to jump to conclusions. After all, he doesn't personally know Nord and has no idea if it's her goal to harm children everyday. In addition, he does know what it's like to be on the receiving end of completely off-base attacks on the Clark Stinks message board. So he wants to hear right from Nord herself why it's a bad idea for government to ensure the safety of toys.

American companies have done a great job reducing their energy consumption over the last decade. In most cases, they don't necessarily do so to be good corporate citizens; businesses do it because it saves them money. But individuals have great difficulty implementing changes that are easy for businesses. There's a real disconnect there. Clark recalls doing weatherization contract work in the '70s during the second energy crisis. Today people have energy audits of their home and don't do anything with the knowledge they get. Partly this is because of human nature. We like immediate gratification and find it hard to lay out cash for an energy-smart payoff down the road. Companies are lucky enough to be eligible for tax credits when they reduce their energy consumption. Now one California community wants to offer free solar power to homeowners up front. The idea is that the government will absorb the costly initial expense and homeowners can pay it back over 20 years. Likewise, one Atlanta suburb that's facing drought is considering having the government pay to put water-efficient appliances in homes. Homeowners can then pay the government back down the road. Clark hasn't yet made up his mind about these two proposals. We have a longstanding tradition of subsidizing corporations when they want to become energy efficient, so should we do it for individuals too? The reality is that people won't get it done when left on their own.