What if humans lived to 150?
“Till death do us part” now means 120 years. Your retirement lasts longer than your whole career.
Five generations at one table. The oldest is 131 and still does the carving.
The announcement
A clinic announces that its treatment works: one injection a year, and the body all but stops ageing. The first patients are in their seventies, and they look strangely relaxed about it.
Pension funds call an emergency meeting. So do several divorce lawyers.
The first year
The queue for the treatment wraps around the block. People start making plans they never thought they would make, like a second degree at 70 or a new career at 90.
Governments do the maths and wince. If retirement starts at 65 and people live to 150, the state pays a pension for 85 years. The retirement age starts creeping up, and nobody is pleased.
A generation later
Family gatherings get huge. A child can have a great-great-grandmother who still drives and still has opinions about how the child is being raised.
Marriage changes most of all. Few couples expect to spend 120 years together, so many sign up for a set term instead, with the option to renew. Being single at 80 is completely normal.
Who wins
- GrandparentsThey meet the great-great-grandchildren, and help raise them.
- Late startersStarting over at 70 is just the middle of the story.
- Doctors who treat ageingTheir most important patients aren’t sick, just old.
Who loses
- Pension fundsThey planned for 20 years of retirement, not 85.
- Young people waiting for a promotionThe boss isn’t retiring. The boss may never retire.
- Anyone waiting for an inheritanceIt’s coming, some time around 2130.
- “Till death do us part”A lovely promise at 25. A very long one at 145.
Living longer is not the same as staying young. The hard part was never adding the years. It is making sure the extra 70 aren’t spent in a waiting room.
Would you take the injection?
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