retirement is kind of a first-world luxury. The way it's always been, and the way it still is in most places, is you work until you can't work anymore and then your kids take care of you. The way you "saved for retirement" 100 years ago was by having lots of kids.

It's only recently that we've socialized it and started to consider it a "right" to be able to live independently until you die.

I guess all I mean by this is that even retirement shouldn't necessarily be viewed as a strict necessity. It never has been. Add it to the list of stresses brought on by living in the first world.