Bleak Speculation: Broke in Retirement in America

Scott Burns bleakly writes about retirement:

Several years ago a Dallas couple approaching retirement disappeared. Well-known on the charitable-event circuit, the couple were in Dallas one day and gone the next. Phone disconnected. No forwarding address. No working cell-phone number.

Eventually, word spread that they were somewhere in Mexico. They had sold whatever they owned, packed their car and headed for the border. They were, conflicting reports said, living in small towns, the kind of places seldom featured in travel magazines.

We can only speculate on what happened. I think they were broke, had little or nothing in savings and knew they had to make a major change to survive on their Social Security income and minimal savings. Like millions of other Americans, their ship never came in. They got older. Work became harder to find. Suddenly, they realized their life was entirely unsustainable. They were heading toward a cliff.

They had to do something radical. Like live in an RV. Or leave the country.

Scott Burns has a bleak view of Americans' future, i.e. retirement from the world of work. Bleak if you agree that having to change one's lifestyle is unacceptable. I think we forget how many people have to change lifestyles in order to survive. People change lifestyles to survive unexpected pregnancy, failure to graduate from high school, college, graduate school, unexpected loss of health or job, separation and divorce.

Should these people also leave the United States? I wonder if Scott Burns would agree.