3 ms·
No, as in those that were going to die in the future, will no longer die in the future. Returning to the average doesn't make sense. There's a fixed amount of d
by taolegal 4y ago
No, as in those that were going to die in the future, will no longer die in the future. Returning to the average doesn't make sense. There's a fixed amount of deaths that have to be spread across the timeline somehow and logic would tell us that lots of early deaths (concentrated very heavily in the elderly range of the age distribution) will necessarily subtract from the future. Of course there's a ton of other variables at play that could hide this reality.
- tchaffee 4y agoThat's not how the math works though. The people who are dead brought the average down because they died at a younger age. The only way to compensate for that would be if those left alive live longer than average. There is no reason to expect that to happen.
- taolegal 4y agoIt seems to me like I'm arguing the instantaneous rate of death will be lower afterwards, since there's a swath of elderly people missing from the population, but you're arguing about the average reverting over time (and specifically that it won't revert from the impact of the pandemic). I don't think the premature death impact of covid will be that large compared to, say, obesity or diabetes. So the impact on the average won't be severe & could be easily offset if our public health leaders produced actual positive results. Instead we've got an unhealthy population and no one accepts the blame.