Retirement Crisis: Experts say global retirement shortfall will top $400 TRILLION

No wonder politicians are now fine with getting rid of the estate tax. Not many people have an estate anymore. Today as Americans age, it’s not about planning who gets what and how much tax must be paid. Seniors are barely able to scrape together enough to simply live out their lives. In fact they’re short… about $400 trillion short.

That’s according to report in Bloomberg detailing the findings of a particularly eye opening World Economic Forum study.

The general gist of the report is this: A perfect storm of longer life spans, investment shortfalls and a continuing business trend of foregoing retirement benefits altogether is setting the world on course for a retirement deficit of at least $400 trillion by 2050.

The organization based its findings on publicly available information from the U.S., U.K., Japan, Netherlands, Canada, Australia, China and India.

“We’re really at an inflection point,” Michael Drexler, head of financial and infrastructure systems at the World Economic Forum, told Bloomberg. “Pension underfunding is the climate-change moment of social systems in the sense that there is still time to do something about it. But if you don’t, in 20 or 30 years down the line, society will say it’s a huge problem.”

He’s right, except that there is actually clear evidence that the retirement crisis is going to ruin the lives of millions of people. Unlike climate change, there’s no room for debate…

Basically, the global retirement emergency is one of the biggest crises unfolding right before our eyes. Yet it’s a problem you aren’t going to hear many politicians talking about.

Just look at the U.S…

Lawmakers are happy to continue promising to defend an entirely insolvent Social Security and Medicare system as a safety net for aging citizens. It’s simply too politically difficult to reform the programs. They’d rather talk about something abstract… like the threat of climate change.

Unfortunately, that means a huge number of dependent citizens aren’t even going to know there’s a problem until the safety net totally collapses.

Imagine the bedlam on the day that the checks stop being delivered and the healthcare benefits disappear. It’ll be devastating.

A huge reason that politicians in the U.S. don’t want to talk about the retirement crisis is that it will also force them to admit how Washington has sold out the American public. Long ago, the nation was handed over to a global banking system. It’s the same system working against the best interests of constituents those lawmakers promised to protect today.

The short version of what this betrayal means for you and me is that our elected officials have spent years creating a American economy entirely based on debt.

If you have a checkbook, you know that doesn’t work… And that’s why those guys at the statehouse and in Washington don’t really like to talk about budgets in plain English.

The political class long ago devoted itself to playing an economic shell game with the American financial future. There’s little else lawmakers can do without admitting the massive fraud they’ve (at all levels) committed to enrich connected friends.

Money, as Bob Livingston puts it, is dead…

Here’s what the lifelong contrarian told subscribers in a recent edition of his Bob Livingston Alerts (subscription required):

I believe our economy is on its last legs, and that there will have to be a very large reset — even a collapse — in the near future. How near is a matter of some uncertainty, as the banksters are becoming increasingly clever in devising new ways to keep their system afloat.

First they successfully replaced real money — gold — with green ink on paper and deflated its value to near nothing.

Now that this game is at an end, they have come up with another even more devious and destructive plan to defraud and enslave the people further by turning real money into digital form for one reason only: to supplant their own fake money with no money at all — debt.

It reminds me of something Michael Ellner wrote in The International Forecaster: “Just look at us. Everything is backwards; everything is upside down. Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, governments destroy freedom [central bankers destroy wealth], the major media destroy information and religions destroy spirituality.”

You could add to that “debt has destroyed money.”

Indeed…

Livingston also pointed out something you’ll never hear an elected official admit: A debt-based economy never actually improves…

He wrote:

The increase in debt is the increase in the economy because credit now equals money. Actual spending doesn’t matter. Savings don’t matter. Money doesn’t matter. Cash is no longer king, credit is.

For Americans unwilling to go down with the system, it’s vital to remember that the credit economy only works when it can rob savers in the interest of enriching reckless borrowers…

Put another way: If you’re comfortable with your conventional retirement investments today, you’re also comfortable with the idea that your hard earned money is quietly being pilfered by currency debasement.

And there’s a bigger problem. When the social safety net falls apart and the broader economy develops a death rattle that can no longer be concealed, the crooks in Washington and cronies on Wall Street will become even more brazen.

You can already see the plans for the outright plundering of private investment accounts developing if you know where to look. For the greater good, they’ll say…

Fortunately for Americans willing to admit that governments and banking systems are working together… against us, there are ways to build a nest egg that financial fraudsters will never be able to touch.

Are you comfortable trusting the same folks that destroyed the economy to reallocate your investments in a way that helps you and everyone else? If so, by all means stick with traditional investments. Do whatever the “financial experts” at CNBC and The Wall Street Journal tell you– and let your mainstream financial adviser continue to fill his pockets with fees from your account while he advises you against any investment that would affect his bottom line.

For the rest of us, a contrarian savings strategy is the only sensible alternative. And that means something different to everyone because, just like traditional investing, finding the right contrarian strategy for you means factoring a number of variables such as age, income and retirement goals.

There is, however, one universal recommendation for contrarian investors: Keep however many hard assets you’re financially able and comfortable acquiring within reach. A personal safety net, if you will, to hedge against the unthinkable.

Here’s a little more from the Bob Livingston Alert:

Why, in the last days of a regime, do governments come so hard after your cash or other assets? Why don’t they just print the paper money? The answer is that if the government can take from the people, it will have to print less money, thereby extending the life of the system.

Knowing this, why would anyone delay getting into real assets? Assuming they had a basic knowledge of financial and economic conditions, the only possible answer is they can’t believe the U.S. dollar — and with it their savings — is headed for the dustbin of history. These are the people who form lines at the bank as the bank closes long after the last of the money is gone.

To protect yourself, we have always recommend gold and silver coins. And to profit from the current system, you should accumulate some gold and silver stocks, as I have also described in these Alerts.

If you are among those who continue to have full faith in the dollar system, I implore you to at least read some of what Livingston is saying… If only to reiterate to yourself why you disagree.

I may be a bit biased… I’ve seen firsthand how Livingston has used his strategy to create a personal financial foundation that’s allowed him to outperform the market even amid recent downturns that destroyed thousands of conventional investors. It’s served as an inspiration for my own strategy.

Livingston sends an email to subscribers of his Bob Livingston Alerts around once or twice a week. Take a look and let me know what you think of his advice.

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