41 ms·

Americans Are Dying Younger, Saving Corporations Billions

313 points by mcone 9y ago

twoquestions 9y ago
Now I'm imagining our economy like some cruel volcano god, demanding blood in exchange for temporary safety. "People's lives are getting worse, look how much money that's making us!" It's as if people exist only to make money, actually making people's lives better be damned. I doubt people will tolerate such a vampiric system for much longer, especially if it doesn't feel the need to conceal it's fangs anymore, and what comes afterward keeps me up at night.
- briantakita 9y ago
  > Now I'm imagining our economy like some cruel volcano god Similar to how the Aztec Gods demanded blood sacrifices, from the best & the brightest of the population.
  - reducesuffering 9y ago
    Source? I believe Aztec sacrifices were almost always prisoners of war from conquered tribes.
    - fergonco 9y ago
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florentine_Codex https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florentine_Codex What I remember is that their criteria to choose who were they throwing to the volcano was very varied and nonsensical. Like "children with more than one hair swirl" (not sure about last word, hope it is clear). And sometimes they didn't use a volcano but just remove the skin of victimes and store them in a cave. They will use the skins to dress up and dance a month later. In any case, victims were members of their society. It was maybe an honor. Yeah, colonizers were brutal, but it seems it was the state of the art back then...
      - yardie 9y ago
        If you mean the rose pattern that develops on the scalp at the back of the head. BTW, having two of those was a sign of luck, or so I was told.
    - briantakita 9y ago
      > I believe Aztec sacrifices were almost always prisoners of war from conquered tribes. One can argue that the America is conquered by Globalist institutions such as foreign banks.
- jrimbault 9y ago
  Yesterday I heard on the tv or radio I heard the metric "€/vote" as if a vote was product.
  - problems 9y ago
    Probably trying to generate something similar to the "cost per conversion" numbers used in advertising. Nothing particularly nefarious about it.
  - jorvi 9y ago
    I read on another HN thread that the top 25% pays 90% of taxes. Made me grok why governments will never really care about the poor pretty clearly. It's harsh, but for cities or even countries the bottom xx% is a net drain.
    - Shikadi 9y ago
      The top 25% would be broke if the bottom 75% couldn't afford their products and services
    - BatFastard 9y ago
      But the bottom 90% do the labor that earns that top 1% all the money.
      - madengr 9y ago
        But the top 1% provide the jobs. Unless the bottom 90% collectively strike, or you "nationalize" everything (that works really well /s), what ya gonna do about it?
        BatFastard 9y ago
        Do they really "provide the jobs" the companies they own provide them. VERY few of those people are critical to the companies they own.
- pillowkusis 9y ago
  Your comparison to "the economy" as some dark being that demands sacrifice has been explored more deeply. It's a good read on why obviously terrible outcomes still happen even though we know it's bad. http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/
  - twoquestions 9y ago
    Not too proud to admit that essay directly inspired my comment, I just wanted to be more concise than SSC (which the opposite of difficult).
- rnabel 9y ago
  This is a good point - what strikes me about these arguments, however, is that the biggest problem (IMHO) stems from the fact that the economy often relies on local optimization, not global optimization. If we optimized human life quality globally everyone would get better healthcare etc., but since everyone makes the decisions that benefit them (+family and immediate surrounding), then we end up with worse healthcare for the vast majority of the population. As such, it should probably be the job of governments (regulation, incentives) to make 'globally' optimized decisions more attractive (centralized healthcare). In a best case scenario at least.
  - twoquestions 9y ago
    That's the theory, it's just that a lot of people frankly have their heads too far up their asses to see how a global optimization is better than the local one. I don't care to be this coarse, but I've been trying for 10 minutes to find a better way of putting it.
    - the_cat_kittles 9y ago
      in my own experience, one of the primary ways people with an analytical bent (looking at you HN) have their heads up their asses is that they seem to think that the market is a perfect judge of value. hard to convince people of your point when they believe such a circular, lazy thing.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - pixl97 9y ago
      >see how a global optimization is better than the local one. When the local maxima and global maxima do not align suffering occurs. This is why evoLuton picks a few broad things on a global scale, but at the local scale thing developed very differently
- WalterSear 9y ago
  That cruel volcano god is the hive mind of a handful of people making their personal lives better.
- pm90 9y ago
  The problem is just that we as a society have never had to plan for such a large proportion of our society being older and thus outside the (regular?) labor force. We created social security nets but they look increasingly like a ponzi scheme, making lots of young pay for the care of the old (in addition to contributions made by the old when they were a part of the labor force). Is this sustainable? I don't know.
  - BuckRogers 9y ago
    It is sustainable if you manage it properly and don't rob the collection plate. Insurance is predicated on the same ponzi scheme, just usually private market based. Some insurance exec couldn't be embezzling millions and still have the numbers work out. I'd say it comes down to good management (as with anything) and priorities. A bad government is going to mismanage it and spend more on the military or other priorities, borrow money to make up the deficits and then of course everyone loses faith.
- lkrubner 9y ago
  As John Maynard Keynes said, the surprising thing is how long a stagnant or exploitive system can last. Such systems can last for centuries.
- rb808 9y ago
  That is a cynical view. Trying to forecast the cost of pension obligations is a real problem that has very real costs to companies, and can send companies bankrupt. The article shows that changing life expectancies mean a change of nearly $10B to estimated costs for just two companies. You can't run people's lives and companies based on hand-waving and assuming it'll be alright. OTOH maybe that is why our vending machine is full of unhealthy snacks. :) + I have to add problems like these is why companies now give 401ks to employees. Whether you live long or not now is the person's problem and the risk is no longer borne by the company.
  - leggomylibro 9y ago
    Another cynical view is that it's a febrile fantasy to put all of your retirement eggs in the basket of an organization continuing to pay you over your entire lifetime.
- HD134606c 9y ago
  Just go for a drive through Los Gatos or Los Altos to know where all the blood and sweat is going. Even just look them up on Zillow with some unusual filters.
Mahn 9y ago
I have this theory that in a couple decades or three most of the developed world will enter a health crisis, as everyone will suddenly realize that we've been eating and drinking like shit for a long time. Almost 3/4 of what you can find in your average grocery store today has unnecessary amounts of sugar, salt and/or chemicals added and no one seems to care. Someday we'll look at the food we eat now like the way we see tobacco today.
- wmccullough 9y ago
  >and no one seems to care I'd have to disagree with that. There are lots of people who care and have tried to be good stewards to the public. The problem is that you also have corporations with major amounts of cash and influence that actively discredit anyone who speaks out. These are facts. For example, whether or not GMO issues are horseshit or not doesn't matter when anyone who speaks out is given a gag order or when we find leaked documents showing that companies know of damage and our systems are so fucked we aren't even allowed to ask about it without getting sued into oblivion. People care, but caring isn't enough anymore.
  - 18nleung 9y ago
    Could you elaborate? I myself haven't seen much compelling evidence against GMOs.
    - coldtea 9y ago
      Aren't those that are making extraordinary claims supposed to bring the evidence? The idea that, given these premises: a) we who don't understand even 10% of how the ecological ecosystem works b) we don't understand even 10% of genes and how they interplay c) we don't understand even 10% of second order effects of such changes d) we don't yet have explanation for tons of interactions and functionality in the body (from what triggers cancers to all kinds of lesser stuff) e) we can't even have a decent dietary advice from medical bodies that is not revised completely every 10-20 years f) corporations will even put plutonium to kids milk if there's profit in it (and then lie about it) g) all kinds of industry-sponsored research has been shown to be paid lies ... GMOs are perfectly safe. It's more like changing various bits in working computer memory, with a ho-hum printout of parts of the program's in-memory structure and a crappy flow-chart of what it does, and wishing that the running program (and OS and such) will continue to play just fine...
CaseInsensitive 9y ago
Well, it's saving Social Secuity billions as well. Not to mention the shift in some of the public worker pensions. California, alone, is between a 214 billion and a trillion dollars UNDERFUNDED already (depending on the studies and their estimates) and that's in addition to the $3.4 billion that will be funded just this year. The article also ignores the steeper increase in mortality in the early 1990s than the 2015 one. Maybe 2015 is just another anomaly. Interesting that the 2007-8 economic downturn didn't affect the mortality rate. With so many people losing jobs or (reducing hours) with their medical coverages and the foreclosure rate spiking it wasn't raising the death rate.
rdiddly 9y ago
So we've reached Peak Human?
GlobalServices 9y ago
It's obesity.
swah 9y ago
I never understood why everyone is against smoking if it saves those corps money in the long run.
- John23832 9y ago
  Maybe I'm wrong here, but I think many of the people responding to you missed the sarcasm.
- ceejayoz 9y ago
  Because we value lives over corporate profits?
  - mathgeek 9y ago
    I wouldn't paint that generalization with so broad a stroke. Very few people truly value lives 100% of the time over corporate profits. If we truly did that, we would never turn a blind eye to many of the actions that corporations take while so many of us own their stock in retirement portfolios. Live, quite unfortunately, is rarely so black-and-white.
  - Majestic121 9y ago
    I think you missed the sarcasm (or I am too optimistic about GP ?)
    - ceejayoz 9y ago
      I honestly can't tell anymore. Poe's Law has gone from "lol" to "this covers virtually everything" lately.
- reactor4 9y ago
  because the last couple of years suck when you're dying from the things caused by smoking.
- cfontes 9y ago
  Lung and throat cancer are no joke, I would rather save them money then die from it.
emodendroket 9y ago
Good news, everyone.
- kalleboo 9y ago
  Thank god, I was worried I would have to suffer on this idiotic planet for another 60 years
- Sleeep 9y ago
  Did you mean for me to read that in Professor Farnsworth's voice? Because I did.
  - niuzeta 9y ago
    Good news, everyone! people are dying earlier, and you're one of them! Yep, definitely a Farnsworth quote.
docdeek 9y ago
Every cloud, huh.
mack1001 9y ago
Sure, also understand that the productive segment is also be affected in turn impacting future GDP calculations. It's a net loss in the long run..
- MacsHeadroom 9y ago
  Are you sure about that? Don't most people stop being productive long before they die?
  - mack1001 9y ago
    The article states that there are higher deaths of despair which affects younger population disproportionately. This impacts productivity and GDP calculations.
briantakita 9y ago
Behold, the wonders of the Scientific Utopia of "Progress". GMOs, Big Pharma, Health (Sick) care system, Compulsory Medicine, outlawing of Natural/traditional "unproven" health care, etc. Is it time to begin discussing the desirability/effectiveness of certain policies, institutions, & popular beliefs?
- cfontes 9y ago
  Sorry, but without GMOs, Big Pharma, Health (Sick) care system, Compulsory Medicine people would be dying even faster. I hate Bigpharma as much as the next guy but just look at the statistics of children deaths in the early 1900 it's clear something changed and medicine and vaccines are among it. Completelly inflamatory statement...
  - briantakita 9y ago
    > just look at the statistics of children deaths in the early 1900 it's clear something changed and medicine and vaccines are among it As did the development of Public Sanitation, pasteurization, electricity, transportation networks, & information networks. Many factors into a complex system, yet attribution to a few select changes that just happen to benefit certain parties. Perhaps it's time to revisit old assumptions based on old P.R. written by parties with conflicts of interest. > Completelly inflamatory statement... Not completely, particularly when speaking to those in an "ideological echo chamber". It helps to desensitize people to opinions that challenge unspoken beliefs. Also, why do we always need to capitulate to the ideologically narrow-minded? America succeeded due to Freedom of Speech & exchange of ideas.
  - evolve2017 9y ago
    I'm unfortunately on mobile and can't write much - however, my understanding is that there is still some debate about the benefits of medication vs sanitation in overall mortality in Western countries. While this doesn't necessarily hold true for children, I thought I'd link to a discussion of this debate. (Can't find the reference I wanted...) Here's a figure for death from infectious disease by the CDC - note that antibiotics don't appreciably change the rate in decline https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm4829a1.htm#fig1 https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm4829a1.htm#fig1 just a random find - this paper from 1902 mentions the debate, too, with some descriptions of 'natural experiments' https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2401255/?page=1 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2401255/?page=1 Also, I am not saying that antibiotics and medications don't work - just that the story actually is more interesting than one might initially guess. Lastly, these data discuss Western populations - I've heard the opposite may be true in poor countries.
LoSboccacc 9y ago
Meanwhile Europeans are working older, to the same effect. The boomers enjoyed a nice work life balance across the classes for the first time in human history, but the ruling class managed to get us back in our place.
- mbroncano 9y ago
  Other than the classical whataboutism, it's blatantly not true. US is mostly a developing country regarding most social and health standards, from general health to lifespan.
  - LoSboccacc 9y ago
    you mean it's lagging behind most indicators from other comparable countries, including equality index, healthcare quality and average lifespan.
- dsego 9y ago
  We are back where we were at the beginning of the 20th century.
  - ptaipale 9y ago
    We most certainly are not. We are really, really far away from it. Beginning of the 20th century was a time when Europe had high child mortality, utilized lots of child labour, pretty non-existing retirement benefits except for a very narrow elite, and abysmal maternal and hospital care. "Spanish disease" (in this case, the bird flu) wpied out hundreds of thousands of people at end of WW I. And even outside wars, violence was much more commonplace than today. Sorry, I must say it's outrageously ignorant to say what you say. Incidentally, I just wrote about early 20th century in another thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14966404 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14966404 When Bismarck introduced the old-age pension system in Germany in late 1800's, the retirement age was 70 years. Life expectancy in these parts of Germany was 67 years. As to the OP article, it seems that surprisingly few people have read this: There’s no simple answer for why longevity gains are slowing. For years, economists and public health experts have been trying to ascertain what’s behind America’s troubling death trends, among them a rise in death rates for certain demographic groups. A much-discussed 2015 paper suggested that mortality was rising for middle-aged white Americans, citing suicides, drug overdoses, and alcohol, collectively sometimes referred to as “deaths of despair.” Women have been particularly affected. What America then is seeing is not that old people, retirees, would die younger. It is seeing working-age people (not necessarily working people) die of unnatural causes.
holtalanm 9y ago
This kind of reads a little like sensationalist journalism, imo. Seems to me that our technology may actually just be hitting a wall in regards to life expectancy. That, and the proliferation of sugar in our every-day diets has long-term consequences (who knew? /s)
- sharemywin 9y ago
  It's culture not technology: "The USA has the highest child and maternal mortality, homicide rate, and body-mass index of any high-income country, and was the first of high-income countries to experience a halt or possibly reversal of increase in height in adulthood, which is associated with higher longevity," wrote the study authors. http://fortune.com/2017/02/23/us-life-expectancy-projections/ http://fortune.com/2017/02/23/us-life-expectancy-projections...
  - dx034 9y ago
    The maternal deaths statistic is not that straightforward. The Economist just had an article about this [1]. It appears that differences in measurements can explain that higher risk. [1] https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21725832-question-harder-answer-you-might-think-pregnancy-america-much-deadlier https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21725832-questi...
    - anon1385 9y ago
      CDC methodology vs UK methodology doesn't explain why California has a rate of 7.3 maternal deaths per 100,000 compared with 22.0 for the US as a whole. Or why the rate in California is falling (like other developed countries) while the rate for the entire US is rising year on year [1]. The author just threw out data (with no explanation of their methodology) until they got the American rate similar to the UK rate and then stopped so they could assert that there's absolutely nothing wrong with the US health industry. The author would have been fully aware of the regional differences in the US because the Economist article is a response to the various articles this summer about maternal deaths in the US which have generally focused heavily on the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative and the improvements California has made compared to other states[2][3]. Not that I'd take the 21 year old interns writing without bylines in The Economist very seriously on health matters (or anything else for that matter). [1] https://archive.cdph.ca.gov/programs/mcah/Documents/MCAH%20Bulletin_MMR%20Decline_May2015_v2.pdf https://archive.cdph.ca.gov/programs/mcah/Documents/MCAH%20B... [2] https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/6/29/15830970/women-health-care-maternal-mortality-rate https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/6/29/15830970/wo... [3] http://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/527806002/focus-on-infants-during-childbirth-leaves-u-s-moms-in-danger http://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/527806002/focus-on-infants-dur...
maaaats 9y ago
How does the pension system in USA work? Do the companies pay you a small salary after you retire? It reads like that. In that case, what about the place you worked until you were 40, are they still on the hook? What if the company closes down?
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  Most pension systems have been phased out. The ones that remain are grandfathered in favor of 401ks for new workers. If existing corporate pension systems default, the US government guarantees (through the Pension Guarantee Corp) the pension at a reduced rate.
- cm2012 9y ago
  Very few companies offer pensions now - mostly the government.
  - chrisseaton 9y ago
    > Very few companies offer pensions now All professional jobs offer pensions, I'm sure. Including all the major tech companies.
    - AdmiralAsshat 9y ago
      Haha, nope. You have the "opportunity" to contribute to a 401k, and if you use the company's (poorly run) 401k option, they may decide to match up to a percentage of your contribution. For instance, I contribute 10% of my paycheck towards the 401k, my employer matches 4% of that. That's it. And I work in IT for a Fortune 500 company.
      - uw_rob 9y ago
        Just to make sure I am correct, your 401k gets matched with 0.004 of your total pay? Thanks
        9y ago
sharemywin 9y ago
But our healthcare is the best in the world...at least I pay like it is...
- richmarr 9y ago
  US healthcare is far lower value for money than other developed nations, at least using average life expectancy as the metric: http://2oqz471sa19h3vbwa53m33yj.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/us-healthcare-system.jpg http://2oqz471sa19h3vbwa53m33yj.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-c...
  - moduspol 9y ago
    Life expectancy is a terrible measure for quality of health care. The best health care in the world won't change how much overeating and a sedentary lifestyle contribute to heart disease (the #1 cause of death in the US), stroke (#5), and diabetes (#7). Life expectancy can vary dramatically by county, even when there are no differences at all in health care policy. [1] That's not to say we aren't paying too much and getting too little. We are. It's just life expectancy isn't the way to measure it. [1] http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/who-lives-longer-study-finds-colorado-wins-20-years-n756471 http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/who-lives-longer-s...
    - richmarr 9y ago
      > Life expectancy is a terrible measure for quality of health care... Depends how you define health care. If you include preventative medicine, education, etc. then things look a bit different. Note sure what happens in the US, but countries that practice what you might call "socialized medicine" do a lot of that.
      - moduspol 9y ago
        Far and away, lifestyle is the biggest contributor. The very source I linked above claims it accounts for 74% of differences, and "access to health care accounted for much of the rest of the difference, the team found." I'm open to contrary claims, but if you're making one at all it's a pretty loose one.
bmc7505 9y ago
But wait, there's good news: If you don't die quickly enough, they'll help! Taking too long to die: Some 'terminal' patients can lose hospice benefits: http://www.news-press.com/story/news/2017/07/28/too-long-die-some-terminal-patients-lose-medicare-hospice-benefits/435340001/ http://www.news-press.com/story/news/2017/07/28/too-long-die...
- yardie 9y ago
  Yes, it makes sense. Hospice is for end of life care. They literally pump you full of pain medication as it is more humane than dying in agony. If your condition is not continually getting worse while under hospice and there is a chance you are getting better than you should be under a different treatment. Hospice is not healthcare it is where you go to die.
buserror 9y ago
I've been saying that for years. Here in europe, the reason the life expectancy is high is that it's based on people who die today at ripe old age, many of them having been retired 30 years, sometimes more... They are 85+, and they drag the mean age of death thru the roof. When THAT lucky generation is gone, I think statisticians will realise that their children are /nowhere/ near as lucky, and I'm pretty sure the life expectancy number will fall off a cliff. I don't have anything to back it up mind you, but raising the age of retirement, more stress related to job stability, whatever, you name it; it's just empirical but I've seen a lot of people in my environment die in their 60's -- many of them who had a perfectly 'sane' way of life. I know what you are thinking, many more people will die at 60 then will die at 90, but I'm still pretty sure there's some underlying pattern here. Also, I do have a vague impression that making access to the NHS more difficult PLUS raising age of retirement EQUAL MOAR PROFITS for someone, somewhere.
- georgeecollins 9y ago
  Are you sure retiring early leads to a long life expectancy? I would expect the opposite. My father still works and he is very healthy for an 88 year old. Anecdote is not data, but people in my family seem to stay healthy by working or staying very active. I think part of the point is to find a avocation that is not stressful, you enjoy, and can do a long time. That may be worth more than money.
  - graphitezepp 9y ago
    I suspect retirement and age expectancy is a correlation NOT causation type of deal. People who have the privilege of affording to retire early are more likely to be educated and chose a healthy lifestyle, thus living longer.
  - buserror 9y ago
    I didn't say inactive, I just said retired. I agree than people who 'stop' will tend to die of boredom. I've got a prime example in my family at the moment. I've also got the other side of the coin where that chap is nearly 90, is on several councils, charities and never seem to sit around for 2 minutes. He's as strong as an ox!
SamBoogieNYC 9y ago
This headline is mindbogglingly dystopic and crass
- baursak 9y ago
  The bright neoliberal future is here!
galactus 9y ago
Finally, some good news! /s
johan_larson 9y ago
Buy every retiree a high-performance motor cycle. They'll have some fun, and when they die you won't need expensive end-of-life care; you'll just need a mop and a body-bag. It'll save billions.
- bkovacev 9y ago
  That was a bit too graphical for my lunch to handle, thanks :D
- thieving_magpie 9y ago
  "I love the movies, love ‘em. Now, I’m watching Terminator 2 the other day, and I’m thinking to myself: They cannot top the stunts in this film, they cannot top this shit, unless … they start using terminally ill people as stunt people in feature films … well, hear me out, ’cause I know to a lot of you this may seem a little cruel. “Aww, Bill, terminally ill stunt people? That’s cruel!” You know what I think’s cruel? Leaving your loved ones to die in a hospital room surrounded by strangers. Fuck that! Put ‘em in the movies! What, you wanna let your grandmother live out her last days in a sterile hospital room, with translucent skin so thin you can see her last heartbeat work its way down her blue veins? Or do you want her to meet… Chuck Norris? Hey, how come you dressed my grandmother up as a mugger? Shut up and get off the set. Action! Push her towards Chuck! (Karate noises) Wow, he kicked her head right off her body! Did you see that? Did you see my Grammy? She's out of her misery, you've seen the greatest film of all time!" - bill hicks
- EADGBE 9y ago
  Not really, assuming every gets a $15,000 bike. it's about $20b more than we spent last year on Medicare. But, It really depends on the bike you're suggesting. Supply and demand for 46.2M units will surely raise the price as well. 46.2M Americans over the age of 65 (retirement age) * $15,000 a bike (conservative, since we're talking "high-performance motor cycle") = $693B. http://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/the-facts-on-medicare-spending-and-financing/ http://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/the-facts-on-medicar...
  - djrogers 9y ago
trentnix 9y ago
The list of municipal and state governments that are trending towards bankruptcy due to underfunded pensions is longer than a rich kid's Christmas list. A shortening life expectancy benefits them most. That's the news here, if there is any.
gthtjtkt 9y ago
Reminds me of this article from The Atlantic last year: > For the last several months, social scientists have been debating the striking findings of a study by the economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton. Between 1998 and 2013, Case and Deaton argue, white Americans across multiple age groups experienced large spikes in suicide and fatalities related to alcohol and drug abuse—spikes that were so large that, for whites aged 45 to 54, they overwhelmed the dependable modern trend of steadily improving life expectancy. While critics have challenged the magnitude and timing of the rise in middle-age deaths (particularly for men), they and the study’s authors alike seem to agree on some basic points: Problems of mental health and addiction have taken a terrible toll on whites in America—though seemingly not in other wealthy nations—and the least educated among them have fared the worst. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/01/white-working-class-poverty/424341/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/01/white-w...
MentallyRetired 9y ago
People still get pensions?
albertgoeswoof 9y ago
It's difficult to predict mortality rates. Advanced healthcare techniques (e.g. CRISPR) could completely eradicate entire classes of diseases (kind of like how anti-biotics and vaccinations changed healthcare completely), or they could lead to nothing. So we might find that the average age of death jumps up by 20+ years in the next 50-60 years (just like it did after WW2). Nuclear war aside we almost certainly won't see a drop in the average age.
- nbates80 9y ago
  The problem is the cost of those techniques. Will it be low enough so that it has an impact on the average (or even better, the median) life expectancy?
  - albertgoeswoof 9y ago
    Probably, vaccines were very expensive when first produced, as were anti-biotics. Given we are potentially entering the age of unlimited power (i.e. via solar/battery tech), we should be able to grow ever more food. Combined with global population growth declining we will see basic quality of life becoming almost gauranteed universally. Then we'll have more and more people + AI working on advancing tech (as they don't have to work on manual things) so production costs should drop dramatically.
  - bluGill 9y ago
    Genetic high cholesterol can easily cost more than $100k in costs over a life time, even assuming that treatment is successful in averting a heart attack. A one time $100k treatment to fix the gene is already break even. That is before we discuss the side effects avoiding them is worth quite a bit to a lot of people as well.
  - tomjen3 9y ago
    If it matters much on the scale, it will be included in all health plans - politicians can't vote for the "Kill grandma" bill.
sddfd 9y ago
The absurdity is that life insurance/pension companies assume live expectancy is actually rising. The company providing my pension fund estimates my life expectancy to 114 years - a fantasy number, albeit one that /increases/ my monthly payment and /decreases/ my expected pension.
- sloppycee 9y ago
  How is that even legal? It's such a blatant rip off. Are you not able to switch providers?
- lr4444lr 9y ago
  Another reason why term coverage, not whole life/universal, is a better choice.
Shivetya 9y ago
purely anecdotal, but when my Doctor tells me he cannot tell fat people to diet because bad surveys affect the reviews of Doctors and their hospital; surveys from both government and insurance companies; it should be a clear indicator we are doing something wrong. He cannot connect their diabetes to their weight, only suggest what foods would help manage their diabetes without crossing the line into mentioning weight management. what are people's actual expectations for how long they should or can live? I am at the age where I am not seeing relatives who I grew up learning from passing on, I am even having coworkers pass on. Perhaps I notice it more when people younger than I go.
- woobar 9y ago
  Interesting. I was never asked to do any reviews of my doctors or other healthcare providers. As for your second question, I semi-jokingly tell my kids that my consciousness will be uploaded to the cloud and I will be posting dad jokes to their twitter long after I am dead. Just need to make sure I pay for hosting in advance.
- nradov 9y ago
  Research has shown that patient satisfaction surveys have approximately zero correlation with care quality or adherence to medical best practices. Consumer directed healthcare has some disadvantages.
Chardok 9y ago
Its not hard to see why exactly Americans are dying younger. Hell, just look at the headline here. When you have increased wealth concentration flowing upwards and more involvement of profit machines in people's lives (healthcare, correctional facilities, food, environment), people on average are working harder for less pay with increased cost of living. This means less recreational time to blow stress off, less time for doctor visits (not to mention the fun games our federal government is playing with healthcare), and less time/money/emphasis to treat yourself spiritually/psychologically. I am hardly surprised this equates to higher mortality rates. America has a huge problem spending money on the betterment of its citizens, and it is starting to show.
- GhostVII 9y ago
  > Its not hard to see why exactly Americans are dying younger American's aren't dying younger, life expectancies are still increasing... The headline is a lie.
- chrshawkes 9y ago
  Yep, not dying as young, just not growing life expectancy year over year as fast this past decade. The title of this article, just like most things in our modern media, are a complete fabrication of the truth.
jorblumesea 9y ago
Personal opinion: Life expectancy gains will actually reverse over the new 20 years, given how little is being done to combat extremely poor health choices many Americans make. Then it will skyrocket due to medical innovations like CRISPR.
miheermunjal 9y ago
wonder how the influx of "corporate wellness" plans affect this. It seems more and more that your lifestyle can be adjusted/improved via your workplace rather than personal drive. Could that be an input into insurance? potentially...
justforFranz 9y ago
Always nice to see a perverse incentive. But thankfully, in America we work for corporations, not the other way around.
- ionised 9y ago
  I'm trying to understand what this comment means.
joosters 9y ago
I don't get it. The article does not say that life expectancies are decreasing. It says that they are still increasing, just not as fast as they were a few years ago. But the article (and most of the comments) seem to think it means that people are dying younger. That's not what the data is saying.
- albertgoeswoof 9y ago
  our media is a wonderful thing
mathattack 9y ago
Looking at the chart, it seems like they're reading an awful lot into 1 or 2 data points. It's very noisy data.
diyseguy 9y ago
cue sardonic grin (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/in-brief-aug-09/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/in-brief-aug-09/)

313 points by mcone 9y ago

Now I'm imagining our economy like some cruel volcano god, demanding blood in exchange for temporary safety. "People's lives are getting worse, look how much money that's making us!" It's as if people exist only to make money, actually making people's lives better be damned. I doubt people will tolerate such a vampiric system for much longer, especially if it doesn't feel the need to conceal it's fangs anymore, and what comes afterward keeps me up at night.

briantakita 9y ago
> Now I'm imagining our economy like some cruel volcano god Similar to how the Aztec Gods demanded blood sacrifices, from the best & the brightest of the population.
- reducesuffering 9y ago
  Source? I believe Aztec sacrifices were almost always prisoners of war from conquered tribes.
  - fergonco 9y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florentine_Codex https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florentine_Codex What I remember is that their criteria to choose who were they throwing to the volcano was very varied and nonsensical. Like "children with more than one hair swirl" (not sure about last word, hope it is clear). And sometimes they didn't use a volcano but just remove the skin of victimes and store them in a cave. They will use the skins to dress up and dance a month later. In any case, victims were members of their society. It was maybe an honor. Yeah, colonizers were brutal, but it seems it was the state of the art back then...
    - yardie 9y ago
      If you mean the rose pattern that develops on the scalp at the back of the head. BTW, having two of those was a sign of luck, or so I was told.
  - briantakita 9y ago
    > I believe Aztec sacrifices were almost always prisoners of war from conquered tribes. One can argue that the America is conquered by Globalist institutions such as foreign banks.
jrimbault 9y ago
Yesterday I heard on the tv or radio I heard the metric "€/vote" as if a vote was product.
- problems 9y ago
  Probably trying to generate something similar to the "cost per conversion" numbers used in advertising. Nothing particularly nefarious about it.
- jorvi 9y ago
  I read on another HN thread that the top 25% pays 90% of taxes. Made me grok why governments will never really care about the poor pretty clearly. It's harsh, but for cities or even countries the bottom xx% is a net drain.
  - Shikadi 9y ago
    The top 25% would be broke if the bottom 75% couldn't afford their products and services
  - BatFastard 9y ago
    But the bottom 90% do the labor that earns that top 1% all the money.
    - madengr 9y ago
      But the top 1% provide the jobs. Unless the bottom 90% collectively strike, or you "nationalize" everything (that works really well /s), what ya gonna do about it?
      - BatFastard 9y ago
        Do they really "provide the jobs" the companies they own provide them. VERY few of those people are critical to the companies they own.
pillowkusis 9y ago
Your comparison to "the economy" as some dark being that demands sacrifice has been explored more deeply. It's a good read on why obviously terrible outcomes still happen even though we know it's bad. http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/
- twoquestions 9y ago
  Not too proud to admit that essay directly inspired my comment, I just wanted to be more concise than SSC (which the opposite of difficult).
rnabel 9y ago
This is a good point - what strikes me about these arguments, however, is that the biggest problem (IMHO) stems from the fact that the economy often relies on local optimization, not global optimization. If we optimized human life quality globally everyone would get better healthcare etc., but since everyone makes the decisions that benefit them (+family and immediate surrounding), then we end up with worse healthcare for the vast majority of the population. As such, it should probably be the job of governments (regulation, incentives) to make 'globally' optimized decisions more attractive (centralized healthcare). In a best case scenario at least.
- twoquestions 9y ago
  That's the theory, it's just that a lot of people frankly have their heads too far up their asses to see how a global optimization is better than the local one. I don't care to be this coarse, but I've been trying for 10 minutes to find a better way of putting it.
  - the_cat_kittles 9y ago
    in my own experience, one of the primary ways people with an analytical bent (looking at you HN) have their heads up their asses is that they seem to think that the market is a perfect judge of value. hard to convince people of your point when they believe such a circular, lazy thing.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - pixl97 9y ago
    >see how a global optimization is better than the local one. When the local maxima and global maxima do not align suffering occurs. This is why evoLuton picks a few broad things on a global scale, but at the local scale thing developed very differently
WalterSear 9y ago
That cruel volcano god is the hive mind of a handful of people making their personal lives better.
pm90 9y ago
The problem is just that we as a society have never had to plan for such a large proportion of our society being older and thus outside the (regular?) labor force. We created social security nets but they look increasingly like a ponzi scheme, making lots of young pay for the care of the old (in addition to contributions made by the old when they were a part of the labor force). Is this sustainable? I don't know.
- BuckRogers 9y ago
  It is sustainable if you manage it properly and don't rob the collection plate. Insurance is predicated on the same ponzi scheme, just usually private market based. Some insurance exec couldn't be embezzling millions and still have the numbers work out. I'd say it comes down to good management (as with anything) and priorities. A bad government is going to mismanage it and spend more on the military or other priorities, borrow money to make up the deficits and then of course everyone loses faith.
lkrubner 9y ago
As John Maynard Keynes said, the surprising thing is how long a stagnant or exploitive system can last. Such systems can last for centuries.
rb808 9y ago
That is a cynical view. Trying to forecast the cost of pension obligations is a real problem that has very real costs to companies, and can send companies bankrupt. The article shows that changing life expectancies mean a change of nearly $10B to estimated costs for just two companies. You can't run people's lives and companies based on hand-waving and assuming it'll be alright. OTOH maybe that is why our vending machine is full of unhealthy snacks. :) + I have to add problems like these is why companies now give 401ks to employees. Whether you live long or not now is the person's problem and the risk is no longer borne by the company.
- leggomylibro 9y ago
  Another cynical view is that it's a febrile fantasy to put all of your retirement eggs in the basket of an organization continuing to pay you over your entire lifetime.
HD134606c 9y ago
Just go for a drive through Los Gatos or Los Altos to know where all the blood and sweat is going. Even just look them up on Zillow with some unusual filters.

Mahn 9y ago

I have this theory that in a couple decades or three most of the developed world will enter a health crisis, as everyone will suddenly realize that we've been eating and drinking like shit for a long time. Almost 3/4 of what you can find in your average grocery store today has unnecessary amounts of sugar, salt and/or chemicals added and no one seems to care. Someday we'll look at the food we eat now like the way we see tobacco today.

wmccullough 9y ago
>and no one seems to care I'd have to disagree with that. There are lots of people who care and have tried to be good stewards to the public. The problem is that you also have corporations with major amounts of cash and influence that actively discredit anyone who speaks out. These are facts. For example, whether or not GMO issues are horseshit or not doesn't matter when anyone who speaks out is given a gag order or when we find leaked documents showing that companies know of damage and our systems are so fucked we aren't even allowed to ask about it without getting sued into oblivion. People care, but caring isn't enough anymore.
- 18nleung 9y ago
  Could you elaborate? I myself haven't seen much compelling evidence against GMOs.
  - coldtea 9y ago
    Aren't those that are making extraordinary claims supposed to bring the evidence? The idea that, given these premises: a) we who don't understand even 10% of how the ecological ecosystem works b) we don't understand even 10% of genes and how they interplay c) we don't understand even 10% of second order effects of such changes d) we don't yet have explanation for tons of interactions and functionality in the body (from what triggers cancers to all kinds of lesser stuff) e) we can't even have a decent dietary advice from medical bodies that is not revised completely every 10-20 years f) corporations will even put plutonium to kids milk if there's profit in it (and then lie about it) g) all kinds of industry-sponsored research has been shown to be paid lies ... GMOs are perfectly safe. It's more like changing various bits in working computer memory, with a ho-hum printout of parts of the program's in-memory structure and a crappy flow-chart of what it does, and wishing that the running program (and OS and such) will continue to play just fine...

CaseInsensitive 9y ago

Well, it's saving Social Secuity billions as well. Not to mention the shift in some of the public worker pensions. California, alone, is between a 214 billion and a trillion dollars UNDERFUNDED already (depending on the studies and their estimates) and that's in addition to the $3.4 billion that will be funded just this year. The article also ignores the steeper increase in mortality in the early 1990s than the 2015 one. Maybe 2015 is just another anomaly. Interesting that the 2007-8 economic downturn didn't affect the mortality rate. With so many people losing jobs or (reducing hours) with their medical coverages and the foreclosure rate spiking it wasn't raising the death rate.

rdiddly 9y ago

So we've reached Peak Human?

GlobalServices 9y ago

It's obesity.

swah 9y ago

I never understood why everyone is against smoking if it saves those corps money in the long run.

John23832 9y ago
Maybe I'm wrong here, but I think many of the people responding to you missed the sarcasm.
ceejayoz 9y ago
Because we value lives over corporate profits?
- mathgeek 9y ago
  I wouldn't paint that generalization with so broad a stroke. Very few people truly value lives 100% of the time over corporate profits. If we truly did that, we would never turn a blind eye to many of the actions that corporations take while so many of us own their stock in retirement portfolios. Live, quite unfortunately, is rarely so black-and-white.
- Majestic121 9y ago
  I think you missed the sarcasm (or I am too optimistic about GP ?)
  - ceejayoz 9y ago
    I honestly can't tell anymore. Poe's Law has gone from "lol" to "this covers virtually everything" lately.
reactor4 9y ago
because the last couple of years suck when you're dying from the things caused by smoking.
cfontes 9y ago
Lung and throat cancer are no joke, I would rather save them money then die from it.

emodendroket 9y ago

Good news, everyone.

kalleboo 9y ago
Thank god, I was worried I would have to suffer on this idiotic planet for another 60 years
Sleeep 9y ago
Did you mean for me to read that in Professor Farnsworth's voice? Because I did.
- niuzeta 9y ago
  Good news, everyone! people are dying earlier, and you're one of them! Yep, definitely a Farnsworth quote.

docdeek 9y ago

Every cloud, huh.

mack1001 9y ago

Sure, also understand that the productive segment is also be affected in turn impacting future GDP calculations. It's a net loss in the long run..

MacsHeadroom 9y ago
Are you sure about that? Don't most people stop being productive long before they die?
- mack1001 9y ago
  The article states that there are higher deaths of despair which affects younger population disproportionately. This impacts productivity and GDP calculations.

briantakita 9y ago

Behold, the wonders of the Scientific Utopia of "Progress". GMOs, Big Pharma, Health (Sick) care system, Compulsory Medicine, outlawing of Natural/traditional "unproven" health care, etc. Is it time to begin discussing the desirability/effectiveness of certain policies, institutions, & popular beliefs?

cfontes 9y ago
Sorry, but without GMOs, Big Pharma, Health (Sick) care system, Compulsory Medicine people would be dying even faster. I hate Bigpharma as much as the next guy but just look at the statistics of children deaths in the early 1900 it's clear something changed and medicine and vaccines are among it. Completelly inflamatory statement...
- briantakita 9y ago
  > just look at the statistics of children deaths in the early 1900 it's clear something changed and medicine and vaccines are among it As did the development of Public Sanitation, pasteurization, electricity, transportation networks, & information networks. Many factors into a complex system, yet attribution to a few select changes that just happen to benefit certain parties. Perhaps it's time to revisit old assumptions based on old P.R. written by parties with conflicts of interest. > Completelly inflamatory statement... Not completely, particularly when speaking to those in an "ideological echo chamber". It helps to desensitize people to opinions that challenge unspoken beliefs. Also, why do we always need to capitulate to the ideologically narrow-minded? America succeeded due to Freedom of Speech & exchange of ideas.
- evolve2017 9y ago
  I'm unfortunately on mobile and can't write much - however, my understanding is that there is still some debate about the benefits of medication vs sanitation in overall mortality in Western countries. While this doesn't necessarily hold true for children, I thought I'd link to a discussion of this debate. (Can't find the reference I wanted...) Here's a figure for death from infectious disease by the CDC - note that antibiotics don't appreciably change the rate in decline https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm4829a1.htm#fig1 https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm4829a1.htm#fig1 just a random find - this paper from 1902 mentions the debate, too, with some descriptions of 'natural experiments' https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2401255/?page=1 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2401255/?page=1 Also, I am not saying that antibiotics and medications don't work - just that the story actually is more interesting than one might initially guess. Lastly, these data discuss Western populations - I've heard the opposite may be true in poor countries.

LoSboccacc 9y ago

Meanwhile Europeans are working older, to the same effect. The boomers enjoyed a nice work life balance across the classes for the first time in human history, but the ruling class managed to get us back in our place.

mbroncano 9y ago
Other than the classical whataboutism, it's blatantly not true. US is mostly a developing country regarding most social and health standards, from general health to lifespan.
- LoSboccacc 9y ago
  you mean it's lagging behind most indicators from other comparable countries, including equality index, healthcare quality and average lifespan.
dsego 9y ago
We are back where we were at the beginning of the 20th century.
- ptaipale 9y ago
  We most certainly are not. We are really, really far away from it. Beginning of the 20th century was a time when Europe had high child mortality, utilized lots of child labour, pretty non-existing retirement benefits except for a very narrow elite, and abysmal maternal and hospital care. "Spanish disease" (in this case, the bird flu) wpied out hundreds of thousands of people at end of WW I. And even outside wars, violence was much more commonplace than today. Sorry, I must say it's outrageously ignorant to say what you say. Incidentally, I just wrote about early 20th century in another thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14966404 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14966404 When Bismarck introduced the old-age pension system in Germany in late 1800's, the retirement age was 70 years. Life expectancy in these parts of Germany was 67 years. As to the OP article, it seems that surprisingly few people have read this: There’s no simple answer for why longevity gains are slowing. For years, economists and public health experts have been trying to ascertain what’s behind America’s troubling death trends, among them a rise in death rates for certain demographic groups. A much-discussed 2015 paper suggested that mortality was rising for middle-aged white Americans, citing suicides, drug overdoses, and alcohol, collectively sometimes referred to as “deaths of despair.” Women have been particularly affected. What America then is seeing is not that old people, retirees, would die younger. It is seeing working-age people (not necessarily working people) die of unnatural causes.

holtalanm 9y ago

This kind of reads a little like sensationalist journalism, imo. Seems to me that our technology may actually just be hitting a wall in regards to life expectancy. That, and the proliferation of sugar in our every-day diets has long-term consequences (who knew? /s)

sharemywin 9y ago
It's culture not technology: "The USA has the highest child and maternal mortality, homicide rate, and body-mass index of any high-income country, and was the first of high-income countries to experience a halt or possibly reversal of increase in height in adulthood, which is associated with higher longevity," wrote the study authors. http://fortune.com/2017/02/23/us-life-expectancy-projections/ http://fortune.com/2017/02/23/us-life-expectancy-projections...
- dx034 9y ago
  The maternal deaths statistic is not that straightforward. The Economist just had an article about this [1]. It appears that differences in measurements can explain that higher risk. [1] https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21725832-question-harder-answer-you-might-think-pregnancy-america-much-deadlier https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21725832-questi...
  - anon1385 9y ago
    CDC methodology vs UK methodology doesn't explain why California has a rate of 7.3 maternal deaths per 100,000 compared with 22.0 for the US as a whole. Or why the rate in California is falling (like other developed countries) while the rate for the entire US is rising year on year [1]. The author just threw out data (with no explanation of their methodology) until they got the American rate similar to the UK rate and then stopped so they could assert that there's absolutely nothing wrong with the US health industry. The author would have been fully aware of the regional differences in the US because the Economist article is a response to the various articles this summer about maternal deaths in the US which have generally focused heavily on the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative and the improvements California has made compared to other states[2][3]. Not that I'd take the 21 year old interns writing without bylines in The Economist very seriously on health matters (or anything else for that matter). [1] https://archive.cdph.ca.gov/programs/mcah/Documents/MCAH%20Bulletin_MMR%20Decline_May2015_v2.pdf https://archive.cdph.ca.gov/programs/mcah/Documents/MCAH%20B... [2] https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/6/29/15830970/women-health-care-maternal-mortality-rate https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/6/29/15830970/wo... [3] http://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/527806002/focus-on-infants-during-childbirth-leaves-u-s-moms-in-danger http://www.npr.org/2017/05/12/527806002/focus-on-infants-dur...

maaaats 9y ago

How does the pension system in USA work? Do the companies pay you a small salary after you retire? It reads like that. In that case, what about the place you worked until you were 40, are they still on the hook? What if the company closes down?

toomuchtodo 9y ago
Most pension systems have been phased out. The ones that remain are grandfathered in favor of 401ks for new workers. If existing corporate pension systems default, the US government guarantees (through the Pension Guarantee Corp) the pension at a reduced rate.
cm2012 9y ago
Very few companies offer pensions now - mostly the government.
- chrisseaton 9y ago
  > Very few companies offer pensions now All professional jobs offer pensions, I'm sure. Including all the major tech companies.
  - AdmiralAsshat 9y ago
    Haha, nope. You have the "opportunity" to contribute to a 401k, and if you use the company's (poorly run) 401k option, they may decide to match up to a percentage of your contribution. For instance, I contribute 10% of my paycheck towards the 401k, my employer matches 4% of that. That's it. And I work in IT for a Fortune 500 company.
    - uw_rob 9y ago
      Just to make sure I am correct, your 401k gets matched with 0.004 of your total pay? Thanks
      - 9y ago

sharemywin 9y ago

But our healthcare is the best in the world...at least I pay like it is...

richmarr 9y ago
US healthcare is far lower value for money than other developed nations, at least using average life expectancy as the metric: http://2oqz471sa19h3vbwa53m33yj.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/us-healthcare-system.jpg http://2oqz471sa19h3vbwa53m33yj.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-c...
- moduspol 9y ago
  Life expectancy is a terrible measure for quality of health care. The best health care in the world won't change how much overeating and a sedentary lifestyle contribute to heart disease (the #1 cause of death in the US), stroke (#5), and diabetes (#7). Life expectancy can vary dramatically by county, even when there are no differences at all in health care policy. [1] That's not to say we aren't paying too much and getting too little. We are. It's just life expectancy isn't the way to measure it. [1] http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/who-lives-longer-study-finds-colorado-wins-20-years-n756471 http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/who-lives-longer-s...
  - richmarr 9y ago
    > Life expectancy is a terrible measure for quality of health care... Depends how you define health care. If you include preventative medicine, education, etc. then things look a bit different. Note sure what happens in the US, but countries that practice what you might call "socialized medicine" do a lot of that.
    - moduspol 9y ago
      Far and away, lifestyle is the biggest contributor. The very source I linked above claims it accounts for 74% of differences, and "access to health care accounted for much of the rest of the difference, the team found." I'm open to contrary claims, but if you're making one at all it's a pretty loose one.

bmc7505 9y ago

But wait, there's good news: If you don't die quickly enough, they'll help! Taking too long to die: Some 'terminal' patients can lose hospice benefits: http://www.news-press.com/story/news/2017/07/28/too-long-die-some-terminal-patients-lose-medicare-hospice-benefits/435340001/ http://www.news-press.com/story/news/2017/07/28/too-long-die...

yardie 9y ago
Yes, it makes sense. Hospice is for end of life care. They literally pump you full of pain medication as it is more humane than dying in agony. If your condition is not continually getting worse while under hospice and there is a chance you are getting better than you should be under a different treatment. Hospice is not healthcare it is where you go to die.

buserror 9y ago

I've been saying that for years. Here in europe, the reason the life expectancy is high is that it's based on people who die today at ripe old age, many of them having been retired 30 years, sometimes more... They are 85+, and they drag the mean age of death thru the roof. When THAT lucky generation is gone, I think statisticians will realise that their children are /nowhere/ near as lucky, and I'm pretty sure the life expectancy number will fall off a cliff. I don't have anything to back it up mind you, but raising the age of retirement, more stress related to job stability, whatever, you name it; it's just empirical but I've seen a lot of people in my environment die in their 60's -- many of them who had a perfectly 'sane' way of life. I know what you are thinking, many more people will die at 60 then will die at 90, but I'm still pretty sure there's some underlying pattern here. Also, I do have a vague impression that making access to the NHS more difficult PLUS raising age of retirement EQUAL MOAR PROFITS for someone, somewhere.

georgeecollins 9y ago
Are you sure retiring early leads to a long life expectancy? I would expect the opposite. My father still works and he is very healthy for an 88 year old. Anecdote is not data, but people in my family seem to stay healthy by working or staying very active. I think part of the point is to find a avocation that is not stressful, you enjoy, and can do a long time. That may be worth more than money.
- graphitezepp 9y ago
  I suspect retirement and age expectancy is a correlation NOT causation type of deal. People who have the privilege of affording to retire early are more likely to be educated and chose a healthy lifestyle, thus living longer.
- buserror 9y ago
  I didn't say inactive, I just said retired. I agree than people who 'stop' will tend to die of boredom. I've got a prime example in my family at the moment. I've also got the other side of the coin where that chap is nearly 90, is on several councils, charities and never seem to sit around for 2 minutes. He's as strong as an ox!

SamBoogieNYC 9y ago

This headline is mindbogglingly dystopic and crass

baursak 9y ago
The bright neoliberal future is here!

galactus 9y ago

Finally, some good news! /s

johan_larson 9y ago

Buy every retiree a high-performance motor cycle. They'll have some fun, and when they die you won't need expensive end-of-life care; you'll just need a mop and a body-bag. It'll save billions.

bkovacev 9y ago
That was a bit too graphical for my lunch to handle, thanks :D
thieving_magpie 9y ago
"I love the movies, love ‘em. Now, I’m watching Terminator 2 the other day, and I’m thinking to myself: They cannot top the stunts in this film, they cannot top this shit, unless … they start using terminally ill people as stunt people in feature films … well, hear me out, ’cause I know to a lot of you this may seem a little cruel. “Aww, Bill, terminally ill stunt people? That’s cruel!” You know what I think’s cruel? Leaving your loved ones to die in a hospital room surrounded by strangers. Fuck that! Put ‘em in the movies! What, you wanna let your grandmother live out her last days in a sterile hospital room, with translucent skin so thin you can see her last heartbeat work its way down her blue veins? Or do you want her to meet… Chuck Norris? Hey, how come you dressed my grandmother up as a mugger? Shut up and get off the set. Action! Push her towards Chuck! (Karate noises) Wow, he kicked her head right off her body! Did you see that? Did you see my Grammy? She's out of her misery, you've seen the greatest film of all time!" - bill hicks
EADGBE 9y ago
Not really, assuming every gets a $15,000 bike. it's about $20b more than we spent last year on Medicare. But, It really depends on the bike you're suggesting. Supply and demand for 46.2M units will surely raise the price as well. 46.2M Americans over the age of 65 (retirement age) * $15,000 a bike (conservative, since we're talking "high-performance motor cycle") = $693B. http://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/the-facts-on-medicare-spending-and-financing/ http://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/the-facts-on-medicar...
- djrogers 9y ago

trentnix 9y ago

The list of municipal and state governments that are trending towards bankruptcy due to underfunded pensions is longer than a rich kid's Christmas list. A shortening life expectancy benefits them most. That's the news here, if there is any.

gthtjtkt 9y ago

Reminds me of this article from The Atlantic last year: > For the last several months, social scientists have been debating the striking findings of a study by the economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton. Between 1998 and 2013, Case and Deaton argue, white Americans across multiple age groups experienced large spikes in suicide and fatalities related to alcohol and drug abuse—spikes that were so large that, for whites aged 45 to 54, they overwhelmed the dependable modern trend of steadily improving life expectancy. While critics have challenged the magnitude and timing of the rise in middle-age deaths (particularly for men), they and the study’s authors alike seem to agree on some basic points: Problems of mental health and addiction have taken a terrible toll on whites in America—though seemingly not in other wealthy nations—and the least educated among them have fared the worst. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/01/white-working-class-poverty/424341/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/01/white-w...

MentallyRetired 9y ago

People still get pensions?

albertgoeswoof 9y ago

It's difficult to predict mortality rates. Advanced healthcare techniques (e.g. CRISPR) could completely eradicate entire classes of diseases (kind of like how anti-biotics and vaccinations changed healthcare completely), or they could lead to nothing. So we might find that the average age of death jumps up by 20+ years in the next 50-60 years (just like it did after WW2). Nuclear war aside we almost certainly won't see a drop in the average age.

nbates80 9y ago
The problem is the cost of those techniques. Will it be low enough so that it has an impact on the average (or even better, the median) life expectancy?
- albertgoeswoof 9y ago
  Probably, vaccines were very expensive when first produced, as were anti-biotics. Given we are potentially entering the age of unlimited power (i.e. via solar/battery tech), we should be able to grow ever more food. Combined with global population growth declining we will see basic quality of life becoming almost gauranteed universally. Then we'll have more and more people + AI working on advancing tech (as they don't have to work on manual things) so production costs should drop dramatically.
- bluGill 9y ago
  Genetic high cholesterol can easily cost more than $100k in costs over a life time, even assuming that treatment is successful in averting a heart attack. A one time $100k treatment to fix the gene is already break even. That is before we discuss the side effects avoiding them is worth quite a bit to a lot of people as well.
- tomjen3 9y ago
  If it matters much on the scale, it will be included in all health plans - politicians can't vote for the "Kill grandma" bill.

sddfd 9y ago

The absurdity is that life insurance/pension companies assume live expectancy is actually rising. The company providing my pension fund estimates my life expectancy to 114 years - a fantasy number, albeit one that /increases/ my monthly payment and /decreases/ my expected pension.

sloppycee 9y ago
How is that even legal? It's such a blatant rip off. Are you not able to switch providers?
lr4444lr 9y ago
Another reason why term coverage, not whole life/universal, is a better choice.

Shivetya 9y ago

purely anecdotal, but when my Doctor tells me he cannot tell fat people to diet because bad surveys affect the reviews of Doctors and their hospital; surveys from both government and insurance companies; it should be a clear indicator we are doing something wrong. He cannot connect their diabetes to their weight, only suggest what foods would help manage their diabetes without crossing the line into mentioning weight management. what are people's actual expectations for how long they should or can live? I am at the age where I am not seeing relatives who I grew up learning from passing on, I am even having coworkers pass on. Perhaps I notice it more when people younger than I go.

woobar 9y ago
Interesting. I was never asked to do any reviews of my doctors or other healthcare providers. As for your second question, I semi-jokingly tell my kids that my consciousness will be uploaded to the cloud and I will be posting dad jokes to their twitter long after I am dead. Just need to make sure I pay for hosting in advance.
nradov 9y ago
Research has shown that patient satisfaction surveys have approximately zero correlation with care quality or adherence to medical best practices. Consumer directed healthcare has some disadvantages.

Chardok 9y ago

Its not hard to see why exactly Americans are dying younger. Hell, just look at the headline here. When you have increased wealth concentration flowing upwards and more involvement of profit machines in people's lives (healthcare, correctional facilities, food, environment), people on average are working harder for less pay with increased cost of living. This means less recreational time to blow stress off, less time for doctor visits (not to mention the fun games our federal government is playing with healthcare), and less time/money/emphasis to treat yourself spiritually/psychologically. I am hardly surprised this equates to higher mortality rates. America has a huge problem spending money on the betterment of its citizens, and it is starting to show.

GhostVII 9y ago
> Its not hard to see why exactly Americans are dying younger American's aren't dying younger, life expectancies are still increasing... The headline is a lie.
chrshawkes 9y ago
Yep, not dying as young, just not growing life expectancy year over year as fast this past decade. The title of this article, just like most things in our modern media, are a complete fabrication of the truth.

jorblumesea 9y ago

Personal opinion: Life expectancy gains will actually reverse over the new 20 years, given how little is being done to combat extremely poor health choices many Americans make. Then it will skyrocket due to medical innovations like CRISPR.

miheermunjal 9y ago

wonder how the influx of "corporate wellness" plans affect this. It seems more and more that your lifestyle can be adjusted/improved via your workplace rather than personal drive. Could that be an input into insurance? potentially...

justforFranz 9y ago

Always nice to see a perverse incentive. But thankfully, in America we work for corporations, not the other way around.

ionised 9y ago
I'm trying to understand what this comment means.

joosters 9y ago

I don't get it. The article does not say that life expectancies are decreasing. It says that they are still increasing, just not as fast as they were a few years ago. But the article (and most of the comments) seem to think it means that people are dying younger. That's not what the data is saying.

albertgoeswoof 9y ago
our media is a wonderful thing

mathattack 9y ago

Looking at the chart, it seems like they're reading an awful lot into 1 or 2 data points. It's very noisy data.

diyseguy 9y ago

cue sardonic grin (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/in-brief-aug-09/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/in-brief-aug-09/)