5/30/2007

The earlier the retirement, the longer we live

I found a graph below from swivel.com -- it shows there is an inverse relationship between the age we retire and the age that we expect to die. According to a study conducted by Dr. Ephrem, based on data of pensioners from Boeing Aerospace, the earlier we retire, the longer our life span is going to be. If we retire at around the age of 50, we would expect to live to age 86, another 36 years old. In contrast, if we retire later at age 65, we would expect to live only for another 2 years.
My father retired at the age of 62 many years ago (he is still alive and doing OK). For the first 2 years after the retirement, he had a tough time adjusting to the retirement life style, mentally and physically. He lost a lot of hair; memory deteriorated dramatically. If above relationship can be confirmed across a large sample, then here is my explanation (among many others) for the inverse relationship: the later the retirement, the harder the adjustment process for retirees. Many people simply can't make it.

Average age at death by Age at retirement

3 comments:

MSU gal said...

I think the older the retirement the more used up and worn out you are from all that hard work!

Anonymous said...

I did a similiar study and found that those who worked until retirement age were usually ill and didn't want to leave the company insurance until Medicaid. Therefore the graph was true...the earlier you retired the longer you lived. And the longer you waited the more likely you were to stay until almost your death.

Anonymous said...

This is not true! Check out the Boeing article (http://www.boeing.com/companyoffices/empinfo/benefits/pension/seminars/Rumor.pdf) and the Sandia Labs article with its own study (page 10 of http://www.sandia.gov/LabNews/LN11-16-01/labnews11-16-01.pdf).