Might just be regional. An insanely high proportion of my rural neighbors are people who did 20 years in the military and started receiving benefits around age 40 and were able to use those benefits to supplement a homestead. How many private sector people drew a pension at 40 and then double dipped? I'm not damning them for it, it's not like many in the military didn't work hard for that money, but it's incredibly difficult for a working class 40 year old these days to fuck off into a rural area and buy a homestead with rural salaries without something functioning as a substitute to that backing it up.
In any case in my rural homestead region there are mainly three classes
1) .gov pensioners
2) successful professionals
3) inherited property
The key to government pensions here I think is that they get benefits early enough in life that they are young enough to build and live a homestead life. At age 65+ you might be able to maintain an established property but buying something affordable (read: rough or vacant land) out and getting it up and running would be pretty rough for most at that age.