I agree. One needs to view this as a mega-trend. Not only will retirees be looking for work because of their underperforming IRA's, 401k's etc.

What do you think will happen when their company pension check is cancelled? Check out the following;

Reuters Business Report
Pension Hole to Hit S&P 500s in 2003
Saturday September 28, 7:48 am ET

By Thi Nguyen

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks slumping for the third straight year will leave large portions of the pension funds of hundreds of top U.S. companies underfunded at the end of 2002, investment bank Merrill Lynch & Co. (NYSE:MER - News) said.

These companies, which include General Motors Corp. (NYSE:GM - News) and some other big names in the broad Standard & Poor's 500 index (CBOE:^SPX - News) , will take a hit to their 2003 cash flow and earnings as they will be forced to contribute billions of dollars to their pension plans -- waylaid by the stock market's spectacular decline since 2000 -- to comply with U.S. laws that protect employee retirement funds.

MORE:
http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/020928/markets_stocks_pension_1.html