Flex Your 401(k): Maximize Your Contributions

Editor's note: As a special feature for Feburary, TheStreet.com offers a four-part series on 401(k) plans designed to help you maximize your retirement savings. Today is Part 1. Here's Part 2. Here's Part 3.

Do you have a 401(k) plan? That is one of the questions most frequently posed by prospective employees at job interviews. Increasingly, the answer is yes.

Traditional pension plans have become virtually extinct, at least for new hires. But 401(k) plans, which allow employees to have a portion of their wages paid directly, or "deferred," into tax-advantaged investment accounts, are booming. Employers love them because they shift most of the cost of saving for retirement to employees themselves. Companies can even pass along some of the administrative costs. ...