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Comment by p1esk | Hacker News Reader

The problem with the Old Age Dependency Ratio - it doesn’t take into account life expectancy. It can make things look good simply because people die before they reach “retirement age”. For example, in Russia, male life expectancy is 66 years. The ratio in the article starts the old age at 65.

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Economically, isn’t that desirable, cruel as it is?

Like it or not, people who don’t work are a burden on those who do.

I’m not saying kill them as I love my grandparents, but having everyone die soon after retiring would fix a lot of the challenges.

There's a middle between the two. Boomers that live lavishly and consume high amount of resources in retirement, going on global golf trips every other week, compared to a retiree who mostly stays in his house and takes forest walks and reading books have very different economic marks.

Also most healthcare is spent in the last 1-2 years in the life of the individual. I saw the system spend so much resources to keep my miserable demented grandma alive for 2 cruel years after she lost her mind. What was the point? She was just in constant pain, emotional and physical. As a culture it should be honorable to chose when we die, go off on our own accord instead of grudgingly push it to the very end. Its unbecoming.

Now the system expects my generation, millennials, to bear the boomer retirement economics on our working backs while we cant even afford our own houses. In Sweden, not only retirees but also the 7% (700 000) refugee immigrants that dont work nor contribute. Yea, that's gonna be a no from me pal.

A workforce that dies younger presumably is a less healthy workforce with fewer useful years of work per person. So, it's not necessarily economically desirable.

Also, the old can take care of the really young, freeing up the young to do other stuff, from working double shifts to fighting wars.

It’s not that simple. We have to consider why in some countries men live 10 years less than the norm for the most of the developed world and how those underlying causes affect the economy.

That's not how the average age works, men in Russia die young and that skews the statistics. If someone lives to be 66, there is a good probability they would live another 10 or so years.

If someone lives to be 66, there is a good probability they would live another 10 or so years.

That’s true, but [1] says men in Russia are expected to live much less than other countries at any age. For example, a 45yo male in Russia is expected to die at 72.4, which is 10 years less than top-10 countries and worse than 138 countries. For 65yo Russia is ranked 109.

[1] https://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/your-life-expectancy-by-...

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