What happens when we all live to 100

[RonBoyd]

What Happens When We All Live to 100? - The Atlantic

A new view of retirement

In 1940, the typical American who reached age 65 would ultimately spend about 17 percent of his or her life retired. Now the figure is 22 percent, and still rising. Yet Social Security remains structured as if longevity were stuck in a previous century. The early-retirement option, added by Congress in 1961—start drawing at age 62, though with lower benefits—is appealing if life is short, but backfires as life span extends. People who opt for early Social Security may reach their 80s having burned through savings, and face years of living on a small amount rather than the full benefit they might have received. Polls show that Americans consistently underestimate how long they will live—a convenient assumption that justifies retiring early and spending now, while causing dependency over the long run.

 

[Alan]

What happens when we all live to 100?

I'll let you know in 40 years.

 

[braumeister]

If I'd known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.

-- Eubie Blake (and others)

 

[soupcxan]

There'll always be enough people drinking, smoking, riding motorcycles, etc. that I'm not too worried about this.

 

[Tree-dweller]

Won't happen in my lifetime.

 

[Andre1969]

Being a car guy, this line caught my eye...

"The latest BMWs are close to perfect. How can an engineer improve on them? But the Model T would be easy to improve on now. When young, genetically we are BMWs. In aging, we become Model Ts. The evolutionary improvements haven’t started yet.”"

Apparently, the writer hasn't heard the old rule of thumb that you don't buy a BMW, you lease a BMW. And you dump it before the warranty is up!

A Model T will break down, get cranky, stall out, etc, and because the fuel is gravity fed, you might have to go in reverse if a hill is too steep! But they'll take a lot of abuse and are pretty hard to kill.

 

[RonBoyd]

There'll always be enough people drinking, smoking, riding motorcycles, etc.

Won't happen in my lifetime.

This article was not for those folks.

 

[W2R]

I'd love to live to 100. I'm probably as financially prepared as anybody should that happen. The only problem is Mother Nature, who sometimes just will not cooperate with our plans and dreams in this regard.

If I do live to 100, I hope a lot of you are still alive too so that I can point out that it really WAS a good idea for me to put off claiming SS.

 

[jetpack]

I know I could go at anytime. I'm really not prepared to go, I'm prepared to stay to 100.

 

[Andre1969]

I'd love to live to 100. I'm probably as financially prepared as anybody should that happen. The only problem is Mother Nature, who sometimes just will not cooperate with our plans and dreams in this regard.

If I do live to 100, I hope a lot of you are still alive too so that I can point out that it really WAS a good idea for me to put off claiming SS.

I'd love to live that long, provided I'm fairly healthy and still have most of my wits about me. My Granddad will hit 100 if he makes it to October 25th, and he's said several times that it just doesn't seem right to have lived this long, that he feels he should have died years ago. He was actually pretty healthy, up until around 97, but then he seemed like old age was finally starting to catch up to him. Everybody he knows from his generation is dead at this point, and all he does is sit around the house, so I guess he just doesn't feel he has anything left to live for.

My grandmother's cousin turns 90 on October 5, and is having a party. She's still pretty lively, and has a lot of energy left in her. But she doesn't go out so much anymore, because most of the people she knows around her age group are either in assisted living, homebound and don't want to go out anymore, or dead. Most of the people in the senior citizens groups, she says, are in their 60's or early 70's, so to her it's like hanging out with her kids.

Sometimes, I think I'd like to live forever, if I could freeze my aging at a fairly young, healthy point in life. I'd just love to see how much the world will change over the coming decades, centuries, etc.

There's an oak tree in my yard that I raised from an acorn. I found it in the gravel under the deck at my condo back in the early 2000's, and put it in a pot, and it sprouted. When I moved to my house, I planted it in the yard...summer of 2004. Now, it's about 20 feet tall. I'd love to see how big that sucker ultimately gets, but I'm sure I'll be long dead and buried before it gets to full height.

 

[Midpack]

I don't want to live that long, so the rest of you can grapple with the financial challenges presented. Demographics are already troublesome, how could longer life lead to longer retirements as some here seem to be assuming? Careful what you wish for, do you really want to work longer? Seems like anathema especially to this audience...

Should research find a life-span breakthrough, the proportion of the U.S. population that is elderly—fated to rise anyway, considering declining fertility rates, the retirement of the Baby Boomers, and the continuing uplift of the escalator—may climb even more. Longer life has obvious appeal, but it entails societal risks. Politics may come to be dominated by the old, who might vote themselves ever more generous benefits for which the young must pay. Social Security and private pensions could be burdened well beyond what current actuarial tables suggest. If longer life expectancy simply leads to more years in which pensioners are disabled and demand expensive services, health-care costs may balloon as never before, while other social needs go unmet.

With each passing year, the newly born live about three months longer than those born the prior year.
But the story might have a happy ending. If medical interventions to slow aging result in added years of reasonable fitness, life might extend in a sanguine manner, with most men and women living longer in good vigor, and also working longer, keeping pension and health-care subsidies under control. Indeed, the most-exciting work being done in longevity science concerns making the later years vibrant, as opposed to simply adding time at the end.

 

[GrayHare]

One large-scale epidemic (I'm not saying it will happen anytime soon) could lower the average.

"I am not frightened of dying. Any time will do: I don't mind. Why should I be frightened of dying? There's no reason for it -- you've got to go sometime."

 

[Rosie]

Thanks to modern medicine, I've seen far too many people living absolutely miserable existences in their old age. I think 80 will be plenty old enough for me.

 

[aaronc879]

Thanks to modern medicine, I've seen far too many people living absolutely miserable existences in their old age. I think 80 will be plenty old enough for me.

Agreed. Based on family history, I expect to be gone or wish I was gone before I hit 80.

 

[M Paquette]

My goal is to make it to 70. At that point, I'll be the oldest surviving male in four generations of the family tree.

 

[Andre1969]

Agreed. Based on family history, I expect to be gone or wish I was gone before I hit 80.

I'm a bit torn on the subject. On one hand, I had two grandparents die at 73. But the two that are still alive are 90 and 99. However, neither one is really healthy at those ages. Grandmom, who is 90, was okay up until around 85-86. Her vision started going around 74 and she had to give up driving when she turned 75, because of macular degeneration, but she still stayed pretty good until the winter of 2009-10. She had a blood clot and had to go to the emergency room. They put her on blood thinners. Then she went anemic, had to go into the emergency room again, and was so weak they kept her in a rehab place for about a month. Now that I think about it, she celebrated her 86th birthday in that place. But, ever since she came home, she had been getting weaker, losing weight, slowly withering away.

As for Granddad, he gave up driving, voluntarily, at 90. And I'd say he was pretty good up until around 95, but then it was starting to catch up to him, and really by around 97-98.

My grandmother's cousin, who will be 90 in a few weeks, is still going on surprisingly well. And now that I think about it, my great aunt (Grandmom's sister in law) is something like 92, and while she doesn't drive anymore, she's still doing pretty well.

I figure if I can make it to a healthy 90, like how Granddad was at 90, my great-aunt, or my grandmother's cousin, I'll be grateful for a long, happy life. But, if I was in my grandmother's current condition, I think I'd want the end to come swiftly for me.

 

[Letj]

Thanks to modern medicine, I've seen far too many people living absolutely miserable existences in their old age. I think 80 will be plenty old enough for me.

If that many are having miserable existence, how come they are not all committing suicide? After all, they have access to a ton of medication, much more than any other generation have had that would easily dispatch them.

 

[Andre1969]

If that many are having miserable existence, how come they are not all committing suicide? After all, they have access to a ton of medication, much more than any other generation have had that would easily dispatch them.

Well, in the case of my grandmother, she wouldn't have the resources to commit suicide. She can't even take the her regular pills without assistance, let alone scoop enough together to overdose.

Plus, her mind really isn't all there anymore, so thoughts of suicide probably don't even cross it. She's probably more worried about what's going to happen to us when she's gone.

I think it's also easy for us to say we'd rather be dead than go through that when we're younger. But, as we age, who knows what kind of feelings we'll have when that time comes? And, I'm sure as you get nearer and nearer to death, the fear of the unknown has to be pretty tremendous.

I also wonder if a lot of older people are more religious than younger ones. I know many consider suicide to be a horrible sin that will send you straight to hell. But most younger people I know aren't as religious.

 

[nuke_diver]

"I am not frightened of dying. Any time will do: I don't mind. Why should I be frightened of dying? There's no reason for it -- you've got to go sometime."

Love Floyd

I'm basing my plan around living to 100 (45 yrs for me). I'm not sure I want to be that old...unless we get nanoprobes to fix all the things that are broken. But you don't usually get to pick when you go

 

[braumeister]

Like many others, all my projections estimate my lifespan as going to 100.

Along with the wonders of modern medicine, things seem to be moving in that direction.
The average age of my eight great-grandparents was 65.
The average age of my four grandparents was 78.
The average age of my parents was 86
So the trend is definitely suggesting that I'll make it to my 90s. Having a couple of those forebears reach 96 is a good sign.

 

[Live And Learn]

As many have stated, a relatively healthy 90 seems like a reasonable age to go. But to the point of the article, if a person is relying heavily on SSI and lives a very long life then they are more "at risk" of SSA not being able to meet payment obligations. When I do a retirement calculator I use 67% of projected SSI to mitigate the risk of SSI not being able to make full payments. How many people need ALL of their SSI payment to meet basic needs ?

But I'm sure these issues will be addressed by our gov't in a way that is fair to all

 

[MRG]

If that many are having miserable existence, how come they are not all committing suicide? After all, they have access to a ton of medication, much more than any other generation have had that would easily dispatch them.

Many do try. A family member quit eating and went off all meds. After 14 days they to forget why they were not eating, or feared kicked in.

In many cases these folks are in assisted living etc. access to their meds is controlled by the facility.

 

[athena53]

If that many are having miserable existence, how come they are not all committing suicide? After all, they have access to a ton of medication, much more than any other generation have had that would easily dispatch them.

My great-grandmother died at age 93 about a week after entering a nursing home. DH calls it "face-to-the-wall syndrome" and has seen it happen with members of his family.

While I'm planning to live to a ripe old age due to my genetics and because I don't want DS and DDIL scrambling to pay for my care, I hope I don't live much past 90. My grandfather (son of great-grandma I mentioned) died at 95 but said "there's such a thing as living too long". My parents are in their early 80s and have had to cut back on things (Dad no longer golfs) and are dealing with numerous body parts just not being meant to last as long as they have.

OTOH, one life actuary I knew said that the steady mortality improvements we've seen over the last century may be leveling out due to obesity, poor nutrition and all the problems those factors cause.

 

[brewer12345]

Bull market for Depends, catheters, walkers, etc. I imagine.

As long as I can totter (or drive my all terrain Rascal) in to the woods and pop some squirrels, I don't mind being around to an advanced age.

 

[unno2002]

[FONT=&quot]As life-spans increase, unless the average age of childbearing rises, there is an increase in the standing population. [/FONT]