Hans Ostrom turns retirement planning into a dark fable. In the first section, a man’s fund is run by animals: crows patrol it, squirrels act as managers in little visors, and because squirrels naturally bury and forget, the dividends simply vanish. It is funny but ominous—the “managed fund” is really managed by instinct and accident. The second section follows a man so worn down by work that he finally retires and asks for his pension. A raccoon hands him a box and leaves; inside are only feathers and leaves. The punchline “His income was fixed” lands with bitter irony. The mood is absurd and quietly bleak, mixing cartoon-like animals with real anxiety about saving, aging, and trusting a system that may return nothing but scraps.
Animals and Investment — Summary
The Managed Fund Crows guarded his retirement plan. They marched around its perimeter. Squirrels managed the fund. They wore small green visors, used their cheeks as briefcases, embezzled by accident, forgetting where they buried the dividends. Fixed Income One day so dispirited by his work was he that he decided to retire. He asked to begin to withdraw his pension. The account-manager, a raccoon, presented a box to him, removed the lid, and waddled away. The new pensioner peered in. Feathers and leaves were all the box held. His income was fixed.