The x% rule is to withdraw x% of your portfolio in the first year and adjust your withdrawals for inflation in later years. The lower the x, the lower your chance of running out of money, but also the less you get to you enjoy spending from your life savings. Any x% rule is very flawed, since it ignore investment returns. Better is a Variable Percentage Withdrawal rule https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Variable_percentage_withdraw..., that does not.

I would be more worried about political change: the risk that a broke government will decide to take any savings (which I think is likely I happen to me in New Zealand).

Demographic problems are clearest in other countries, but the US won't be immune to the pressure.

I look at other worse off countries, and I see their governments screw over their savers. I have little faith that my own government will act differently.

I've become more sceptical/cynical and I truly believe retirement savings will be stolen. (e.g. our lefty party wants to tax wealth at 2% - which if you're withdrawing at 2.7% is effectively a huge ~40% tax rate)

I'm not sure what the answer is, but I don't think that we can copy what worked for our parent's generation.

What percentage of my retirement savings should I allocate for romance scams and pig butchering? Asking for the hundreds of millions of people scammed each year.