Whether he's been cheated or not depends on your values. Many people cheerfully give up revenue maximization in order to perform some service they perceive to be of great value. You can't really have a meaningful political movement without such people.
At 53 years old and $25,000/year, he almost certainly has not prepared for any reasonably comfortable or safe/secure retirement (not knowing anything else about his personal life). There will come a point where he simply cannot work. He must take care of himself first. Or, to put it another way, if he doesn't take care of himself, then he'll reach a point where he can no longer take care of GPG, much less any dependents.
He lives in Germany, I imagine they have some form of a state retirement program.
I'm actually curious now of how many first world countries are as backwards as the US where if you retire without any personal savings you are extremely screwed.
You are not that much better off in Germany or generally North Europe, because pensions are earned through payments during career (three pillars: tax-like mandatory contribution, voluntary contribution, and thirdly a private insurance), and if you are not able to accumulate that kind of savings (which in some cases are more like "years worked for system" than actual money saved) then your old-age pension is going to be not entirely unlike the old-age social security in the U.S.
