When brokerage firms and mutual fund companies paint a picture of what life is -- or will be -- like for older Americans, it is usually an idyllic scene, seemingly plucked from an updated version of a Norman Rockwell painting.

Of course, this doesn't take account of today's realities: stagnant incomes, widening inequality and an unraveling of the "public-private framework of security" that has left Americans "exposed to the harshest risks of our turbulent economy," according to Jacob Hacker, author of The Great Risk Shift.

Arguably, the tragic circumstances detailed in the following Associated Press report, "Study: Bankruptcies Soar for Senior Citizens," seem a better reflection of how many senior citizens are faring than the cartoon imagery spewed out by the financial services industry and its slick marketing teams.

First came the health problems. Then, unable to work, Ada Noda watched the bills pile up. And then, suffocating in debt, the 80-year-old did something she never thought she'd be forced to do.

She declared bankruptcy.

While the bankruptcy filing rate for those under 55 has fallen, it has soared for older Americans, according to a new analysis from the Consumer Bankruptcy Project, which examined a sampling of noncommercial bankruptcies filed between 1991 and 2007.

The older the age group, the worse it got — people 65 and up became more than twice as likely to file during that period, and the filing rate for those 75 and older more than quadrupled.

"Older Americans are hit by a one-two punch of jobs and medical problems and the two are often intertwined," said Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard Law School professor who was one of the authors of the study. "They discover that they must work to keep some form of economic balance and when they can't, they're lost."

That's precisely what happened to Noda. She worked all her life, on a hospital's housekeeping staff, and later selling boat tickets to tourists. She cut corners when she needed to but always paid the bills she neatly logged in a ledger.

"I was born during the Depression," she said. "I paid the bills whether I ate or didn't, whether I went to the doctor or not."

It all worked fine for Noda, a widow for 23 years, until she was forced to undergo double-bypass surgery and deal with respiratory problems. She started using two credit cards more frequently for food and bills. Before long, she was $8,000 in debt and behind on car payments.

"I'd go to bed and all I had on my mind was bankruptcy," she said.