I re-watched the 1987 movie "Wall St." on cable last night. Pensions figured in a (now) strange way. Gordon Gecko wanted to buy and break up/sell the small airline where Martin Sheen's character worked so that Gordon could milk the airline's pension plan, which was OVERFUNDED. Very funny in contemporary terms: employees apparently actually had defined benefit pensions in those ancient times and the fund had too much money in it (compare GM and Chrysler). How times have changed!

Yes, it is very sad what has happened to pensions. I have a brother who is a United Airlines pilot. He originally expected to get a 100k pension upon retirement. Then it was sold out to the federal pension board, where he might get 18k. A significant difference.

However, in the European nations where they get guaranteed pensions, don't the people pay a very high rate of annual taxation?