Right now the federal government does everything in its power to crush retirees. Interest rates on savings are essentially zero while inflation removes several percent every year. Active speculation with retirement savings is the only way to fight inflation - with the potential of serious investment losses late in life with no time left to wait for the markets to turn around. I guess the only thing left is to just steal whatever savings have managed to survive their attacks.
“Right now the federal government does everything in its power to crush retirees. Interest rates on savings are essentially zero while inflation removes several percent every year...”
You’ve zeroed in on the real reason right here. Government sets it’s own interest rate by buying the bonds with the left hand that it’s right hand is selling - all so it can keep borrowing and spending at an artificially low cost.
If forced (like it eventually will) to borrow at a market rate, retirees would be able to do just fine.
However, in the artificially low interest rate environment another oddity surfaces: That nearly every federal retiree - even on the lowest rung - is a defacto millionaire - because it requires millions in principal at low interest rates to generate the income a federal retiree receives. A cost which further requires the government to fake the interest rates lower.
Every fireman, every policeman, every bureaucrat, every government functionary is a millionaire. The people that pay for it all are mere serfs to do their bidding.
You want class warfare - that’s where you’ll get it for real. Producers vs. takers.