I think the problem with a mandatory savings program (above and beyond Social Security, which leaves plenty of retirees below the poverty line) is that in reality, the vast majority of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, and those of us which have some leeway have little concept of how US citizens *actually* live. I am lucky enough to be a physician, but was 35 years old with 3 kids before I became an attending physician and no longer lived paycheck to paycheck, so I was 35 years old before we actually started saving for retirement and we're now desperately trying to make up for lost time (and I acknowledge some personal choices of having children before we could actually "afford" them as well).
I have not fact checked, but this has been floating around the internet for awhile and says a lot about the bigger problem in our country, income equality: http://www.upworthy.com/9-out-of-10-americans-are-completely-wrong-abou… We are now a society that requires at least 2 incomes just to keep our families afloat, but where the CEO of a large corporation makes, what? 100x? what the average employee makes. Retirement savings for my family, until very recently, was impossible and I suspect a good chunk of the U.S. population feels the same.