Excerpt: One of the supposed beauties of 401(k) plans is their portability: Job-hopping employees can preserve their retirement benefits by moving their balances from one employer to the next or into an individual retirement account. But 45 percent of employees who left their jobs in 2004 withdrew their 401(k) balance in cash instead of keeping it in some type of tax-sheltered retirement account, according to new study of large-company plans by Hewitt Associates.  MORE >>