How about the example of the one successful country full of smart people? Among rich nations, the only example the magazine could find is the Netherlands. They have “a higher ratio of pension assets to GDP than any other country”, with 100% funding, basically, for the actuarially predicted costs. They retire younger than Americans (age 62.1 versus 65.5). Part of the magic is that they don’t promise unlimited inflation indexing. If their country gets poorer, the pain will be shared by the working and non-working alike. The same is true in Sweden, Germany, and Japan. But mostly the Dutch have deferred consumption. Overall, the countries that have at least some plan and hope for paying what they’ve promised are the Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, Australia, and Canada (this doesn’t include developing countries such as China, which has $3 trillion in cash and hasn’t made any long-term promises).