I understand it's a goal, but there's a lot to do to get there. I personally find it at once a distasteful goal philosophically, while the lazy me gets up and salutes. You'd have to find a way to continue production and distribution of goods and services when a rising % of your population isn't working. It is very easy, relatively, to get people excited about working a 40 hour week until 55 and then getting 80% of your pay thereafter. And once in place, good luck getting it changed - as Japan is experiencing.

There is an underlying truth to your point that the right is missing.

The right hates "lazy" and the IDEA of someone ELSE getting something for nothing. But when you look at how successfully the US produces stuff and imports the rest, and how few of us it takes to actually produce and build, you realize that we are already doing what you suggest in disguised fashion. The government and much of the service, retail and finance industry seems to very successfully funnel money to hard working people who we don't need to be working in mines, fields, factories and construction sites. We get other things out of them, but we don't NEED them. And the rest of the world positively delights in sending us more stuff for, essentially, nothing in return.

I personally think retirement at 55 is a big mistake - what will that mean when we live to 100 and beyond? And especially when we can't even manage to get everyone working now with a decent wage that enables them to buy enough stuff such that the economy can afford to hire them?

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Lle naa haran e' nausalle.