Canada

There's another type of citogenesis going on with articles and internet comments. Writers look to social media to see what people are talking about / what will get engagement. Internet commenters talk about the article taking the points that strike a chord. Writers see what the users are talking about and write about that. Internet comments react. Writers see the comments and publish accordingly. Rinse. Repeat.

Some iterations later people have piles of articles to point to as proof. The articles have been repeating back their own words written by someone else with ostensible credibility because it's been published.

A major problem aside from that itself is internet comments need to boil everything down to simple one liner takes. The world isn't simple like that. People could do long form investigative journalism. And then the internet comments would boil it down to a single easily digestible take that washes away all analysis.

Agreed. The headline is extremely misleading clickbait.

This piece is reporting on what people think they need, not what they actually need (which is highly context dependent), which by itself isn't very interesting.

The real story is the huge divergence between what people say they need vs what they're actually targeting, but that's not news, we've known about it for decades (basically every since the defined benefit pension plan ended).

I've heard 4% rule, but for myself I use an investment firm that does monte carlo projections, with ages, spending rates, and current assets to give you a rough idea of likelihood of assets lasting till death.

Ive also played with a few of the retirement calculators made by the FIRE crowd i.e. https://www.schwab.com/learn/story/beyond-4-rule-how-much-can-you-spend-retirement

How grim does our future need to look before society slaps itself in the face and demands to have better wealth distribution?

Nothing is going to change until the wealthy fear for their bank accounts and/or their lives.

Want things to the change? Make the Rich Afraid Again.

Can I join your club? I'm in my 50s. I have worked since I was 14 years old... full time since I was 17. I worked most of my adult life outside of Canada, so I do have some state pension saved up outside of Canada, but it's nowhere near enough to live on in Canada. I moved back to Canada a few years ago with a "seemed like a good idea at the time" decision. In total, I have worked less than 10 years of my life in Canada... so my CPP is basically zero. I look at what Canada has to offer me and think... what the hell am I doing here? It's fucking expensive to live here... I have nothing to retire on... and only homelessness ad starvation to look forward to.

So... while I'm still employable, fit, and healthy, I'm planning on getting back out.... this year actually if all goes to plan.