Historical tracking does indicate that the 4% rule can and does work, but "most of the time" isn't exactly comforting when you're the person living through a scenario where it turns out it doesn't work. You also have to consider that you might need to reduce spending during bad years, which is a struggle for retirees who want a certain lifestyle.The biggest risk with this strategy is how you approach your sequence of returns. For example, if you retire right before a bear market and start selling shares whi ...