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Emergency retirement plan: elder suicide. "Emergency retirement plan: revolver with 3 bullets... in case the first 2 don't work. Coming soon to an America near you." A prophetic comment by Mike Hunt on an otherwise sober post called "Inflation and Its Impact on Retirement" by Rod Ferguson.

With just 20 percent of today's working Americans expected to be financially secure in retirement, we will almost certainly be considering socially sanctioned suicide among our options. In a deeply tragic way, it will be fascinating to see how elder suicide will become ritualized, dignified, and euphemized as our society collectively begins to understand the gravity of the lost Bush decade — investment returns of crucial importance that never materialized. As workers now deplete their Bush-stagnant 401(k) plans to pay for their financial Bush-hardships in gasoline and real estate, there will be even less savings for them to depend upon in the coming decade.

Those who would privatize Social Security, i.e., Republicans, are exactly the ones who cannot produce a viable economy with market returns that would justify such a radical rethinking of America's most successful social program.

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