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There's a massive spike in mortality for those who retire from work versus those who keep working. In fact, working just a single year after you're 65 is associ

by 0xy 5mo ago

There's a massive spike in mortality for those who retire from work versus those who keep working. In fact, working just a single year after you're 65 is associated with 11% lower risk of death for healthy people and 9% for unhealthy. Working is objectively good for your health. Stopping work is associated with an extremely large increase in mortality risk, for both healthy and unhealthy people. Any alternatives must weigh the resulting death it will cause.

pessimizer 5mo ago
Did any of that signal come from people who hadn't spent the last 40 or 50 years working, in a society constructed around working? If I had a study that showed increased mortality in people who had owned a parrot for 50 years in the year after that parrot died, you wouldn't cite it as evidence of the basic human need for a parrot.
marginalia_nu 5mo ago
How are we sure about the direction of cause and effect here? I'd expect more healthier people to self-select the working cohort, all else being equal.
- amanaplanacanal 5mo ago
  Yeah this seems like an obvious confounder.
- asdff 5mo ago
  In practice it doesn't really work that way. It isn't like "I am ill bodied, I ought to retire." It is more like "I am ill bodied, but I can't afford to retire, so I must work in some capacity." People who retire early are probably far more likely to be wealthier, and that is correlated with healthspan.
  - marginalia_nu 5mo ago
    It's hard to prove or falsify this statement.
    - asdff 5mo ago
      > Early retirement is increasingly a preserve of the wealthy. Back in 2002–03, the fraction of those who were retired aged 55–64 was fairly similar across the wealth distribution: 20% in the poorest fifth compared to 28% for the wealthiest fifth. In contrast, by 2018–19, only 7% of the poorest fifth were retired, while for the wealthiest fifth it was still 24%. https://ifs.org.uk/news/early-retirement-increasingly-concentrated-amongst-wealthy https://ifs.org.uk/news/early-retirement-increasingly-concen...
      - marginalia_nu 5mo ago
        Right, but the original post was about working past retirement age, not retiring early. It's unlikely the last two US presidents have been working in their 70s and 80s because they can't afford retirement. I'm not aware of anyone working past 80 that haven't been a professor, CEO, politician, etc. Regardless it's a confounder, statement otherwise now being that affluence predicts mortality.
confidantlake 5mo ago
[flagged]
- 0xy 5mo ago
  The study controlled for that. Unhealthy people who continue working have lower mortality than those who stop working.

by 0xy 5mo ago

pessimizer 5mo ago

Did any of that signal come from people who hadn't spent the last 40 or 50 years working, in a society constructed around working? If I had a study that showed increased mortality in people who had owned a parrot for 50 years in the year after that parrot died, you wouldn't cite it as evidence of the basic human need for a parrot.

marginalia_nu 5mo ago

How are we sure about the direction of cause and effect here? I'd expect more healthier people to self-select the working cohort, all else being equal.

amanaplanacanal 5mo ago
Yeah this seems like an obvious confounder.
asdff 5mo ago
In practice it doesn't really work that way. It isn't like "I am ill bodied, I ought to retire." It is more like "I am ill bodied, but I can't afford to retire, so I must work in some capacity." People who retire early are probably far more likely to be wealthier, and that is correlated with healthspan.
- marginalia_nu 5mo ago
  It's hard to prove or falsify this statement.
  - asdff 5mo ago
    > Early retirement is increasingly a preserve of the wealthy. Back in 2002–03, the fraction of those who were retired aged 55–64 was fairly similar across the wealth distribution: 20% in the poorest fifth compared to 28% for the wealthiest fifth. In contrast, by 2018–19, only 7% of the poorest fifth were retired, while for the wealthiest fifth it was still 24%. https://ifs.org.uk/news/early-retirement-increasingly-concentrated-amongst-wealthy https://ifs.org.uk/news/early-retirement-increasingly-concen...
    - marginalia_nu 5mo ago
      Right, but the original post was about working past retirement age, not retiring early. It's unlikely the last two US presidents have been working in their 70s and 80s because they can't afford retirement. I'm not aware of anyone working past 80 that haven't been a professor, CEO, politician, etc. Regardless it's a confounder, statement otherwise now being that affluence predicts mortality.

confidantlake 5mo ago

[flagged]

0xy 5mo ago
The study controlled for that. Unhealthy people who continue working have lower mortality than those who stop working.