Let 2008 be the year you finally carry through on your promise to pay more attention to your 401(k) retirement savings plan at work. If you are like most people, you have had plenty of good intentions. You have promised yourself that you will save more or figure out just which funds you should really be using. Here's what you can do now to make your money work better for you in the future.

If you accumulate $500,000 by the time you retire, you would be able to remove about $20,000 the first year you retire, increase it a little each year to handle inflation, and probably have enough money to last you to 90 or 95. If you accumulate $1 million, you would be able to remove about $40,000 or $50,000. To know with more certainty what you will need and how much you need to save, try the "ballpark estimate" at

http://www.choosetosave.org. As a rule of thumb, if you start saving 10% of your pay in your 20s, you should be fine. If you start in your 30s, it's about 15%.

Savings Accounts in banks are no place for the retirement money you are trying to build. Savings accounts are for the stash of emergency money you might need over the next three to six months if you lose a job or encounter a major unexpected expense.

If you are 30, have $5,000 in a savings account, don't add another cent and leave the money invested for 35 years, you could end up with close to $10,000. In a 401(k), that same $5,000 would become $74,000 if you made 8 percent a year on stock and bond mutual funds.

Besides better investment options, the 401(k) helps you out more by holding taxes at bay. If you have money in a savings account, or an investment account outside a 401(k) or an individual retirement account (IRA), Uncle Sam shows up each year and makes you pay taxes on what you've earned. That's not the case with a 401(k). Every penny you put in stays there to keep earning interest. And Uncle Sam also gives you a tax break when you put money into your 401(k).

Maybe you think saving $1 million by the time you retire is a complete fantasy - the world of rich people, not people like you.

You probably aren't considering the free money your employer will give you, or what's called matching money, when you contribute. The matching money can help turn modest savings into a giant sum over time.

Some employers do a good job of selling their employees on receiving the matching money they will offer. But don't stop with the minimum.

This is often more difficult for people than saving money, but it doesn't have to be. You just need to recognize a few words and then diligently make sure the mutual funds carrying those key words end up in your 401(k).

First, be aware that there is no such thing as a single "right" mutual fund. Often, people think the fund that has made the most money recently is the easy choice. But that approach is destined to get you into trouble because the stock market goes through cycles. As those cycles change, last year's winning mutual funds eventually will become losers, and the losers will turn out to be winners.

For example, recently international mutual funds have been the winners. And funds that invest in large U.S. companies, or large-cap funds, have been laggards. But at the end of the 1990s, it was just the opposite. Investors loved large-cap funds and shunned international funds.

No one can guess when the cycles will change.

So do what financial planners do. They never try to pick the one best fund. Instead, they buy a variety of mutual funds and stick with the mixture, even when one of the funds temporarily looks like a disappointment.