For U.S. taxpayers, there are just too many darn confusing accounts with a mountain of rules. Having to have a checking, savings, IRA, 401K, 529, and an HSA is wasteful. We have all of these different types of accounts because our income tax rates are too high and the deductions and credits are too many. In my ideal world, the average person would only “need” two accounts : spending and savings. Since we don’t live in my ideal world and we do have a high income tax and many different deductions and credits to allow the government to engineer society, then can we at least cut it down to three accounts : spending, savings, and society. The “society” account would contain all of your retirement money, health care money, education money, and whatever else the government has decided is of benefit to “society”. Contributions to the account could be tax deductible, the earnings could grow tax free, and withdrawals could be limited to the above mentioned government approved expenditures. Wouldn’t that be easier?