This can make sense for middle aged workers, and we should all be very concerned and sympathetic and as helpful as we can be for those people. But for a 62 year old to spend all his severance and retirement fund unrealistically "trying to hold on" is just nuts.
There was a WSJ article on this guy last week with more financial details. The bottom line was that he had around $25,000 in severance pay and $13,000 in a retirement fund. Common sense should have told him that his chances for getting a comparable again anytime soon or ever, were very very small. Having royally screwed up his finances by RENTING all these years, he could still have improved his dire situation by ditching the house quickly, and paying cash for a little home in a semi-rural area (you can get a decent mobile home or similar size regular home on an acre or so for $20,000 in many areas, and the taxes are next to nothing in those areas). Then he and his wife would have a home that nobody could kick them out of, and with their meager retirement fund plus social security (he has to have a decent SS income, as he's worked in good jobs for 36+ years), they could afford health insurance, food, heat, a modest used vehicle, and a very few "extras". Of course he threw this security out the window when he spent his entire severance package on RENT!, AFTER it was clear that he was in a desperate predicament.