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Extra Time: 10 Lessons for an Ageing World
‘An inspirational call to arms’ DAILY MAIL
‘This book is so sensible, so substantially researched, so briskly written, so clear in its arguments, that one wishes Baroness Cavendish was still whispering into the prime ministerial ear’ THE TIMES
‘A thoughtful handbook to help societies age gracefully’ FINANCIAL TIMES
‘This bold, visionary book is a wake-up call to governments. It is a wake-up call to us all’ SUNDAY TIMES
From award-winning journalist, Camilla Cavendish, comes a profound analysis of one of the biggest challenges facing the human population today.
The world is undergoing a dramatic demographic shift. By 2020, for the first time in history, the number of people aged 65 and over will outnumber children aged five and under. But our systems are lagging woefully behind this new reality. In Extra Time, Camilla Cavendish embarks on a journey to understand how different countries are responding to these unprecedented challenges.
Travelling across the world in a carefully researched and deeply human investigation, Cavendish contests many of the taboos around ageing. Interviewing leading scientists about breakthroughs that could soon transform the quality and extent of life, she sparks a debate about how governments, businesses, doctors, the media and each one of us should handle the second half of life. She argues that if we take a more positive approach, we should be able to reap the benefits of a prolonged life. But that will mean changing our attitudes andusing technology, community, even anti-ageing pills, to bring about a revolution.
‘This book is so sensible, so substantially researched, so briskly written, so clear in its arguments, that one wishes Baroness Cavendish was still whispering into the prime ministerial ear’ THE TIMES
‘A thoughtful handbook to help societies age gracefully’ FINANCIAL TIMES
‘This bold, visionary book is a wake-up call to governments. It is a wake-up call to us all’ SUNDAY TIMES
From award-winning journalist, Camilla Cavendish, comes a profound analysis of one of the biggest challenges facing the human population today.
The world is undergoing a dramatic demographic shift. By 2020, for the first time in history, the number of people aged 65 and over will outnumber children aged five and under. But our systems are lagging woefully behind this new reality. In Extra Time, Camilla Cavendish embarks on a journey to understand how different countries are responding to these unprecedented challenges.
Travelling across the world in a carefully researched and deeply human investigation, Cavendish contests many of the taboos around ageing. Interviewing leading scientists about breakthroughs that could soon transform the quality and extent of life, she sparks a debate about how governments, businesses, doctors, the media and each one of us should handle the second half of life. She argues that if we take a more positive approach, we should be able to reap the benefits of a prolonged life. But that will mean changing our attitudes andusing technology, community, even anti-ageing pills, to bring about a revolution.
268 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 2, 2019
90 people are currently reading
493 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
July 29, 2019
We are all going to liver longer and healthier. Cavendish spent time travelling the globe to find best practices, including Singapore! So a must read for Singaporeans.
The most important concept is to divide the old into the ‘young’ or healthy old, and the ‘old’ or unhealthy old. The age itself is not a good indicator of the division.
1. Birth rate is declining so there will be many more older people as compared to the young. The old social security system will become unsustainable, because there will be more people drawing out money than people putting in. So the young old should continue to work, teach, consult to pass on this know-how. BMW has found dramatic improvement in productivity after fitting its factories with help for its aging work force!
2. This will benefit the economy, and keep people healthy because they will be able to contribute to society. Meanwhile, silicon valley is conducting research to prolong life. Metformin, NMN, calorie restriction and exercise are all candidates. But the most important may yet be social connectedness; and that’s why working is good. Singapore has been praised for its Skills Future Credit where the government funds every citizen to learn new skills to adapt to the rapidly changing future.
3. In aging societies, there won’t be enough carers for the old at current prices. The Lack of recognition and low pay do not help either. So maybe robots and animals will help. The old can also live with college students with mutual benefits. Singapore is building retirement villages and multi-generation jumbo government housing again.
4. In some societies like Japan, the young with unstable part time job with low pay and no pension develops resentment of the old who they are supporting. The same is happening in the West; it’s notoriously difficult to cut benefits so it is going to the biggest challenge for this century. However one thing is certain: benefits will be given later, and less will be given
The most important concept is to divide the old into the ‘young’ or healthy old, and the ‘old’ or unhealthy old. The age itself is not a good indicator of the division.
1. Birth rate is declining so there will be many more older people as compared to the young. The old social security system will become unsustainable, because there will be more people drawing out money than people putting in. So the young old should continue to work, teach, consult to pass on this know-how. BMW has found dramatic improvement in productivity after fitting its factories with help for its aging work force!
2. This will benefit the economy, and keep people healthy because they will be able to contribute to society. Meanwhile, silicon valley is conducting research to prolong life. Metformin, NMN, calorie restriction and exercise are all candidates. But the most important may yet be social connectedness; and that’s why working is good. Singapore has been praised for its Skills Future Credit where the government funds every citizen to learn new skills to adapt to the rapidly changing future.
3. In aging societies, there won’t be enough carers for the old at current prices. The Lack of recognition and low pay do not help either. So maybe robots and animals will help. The old can also live with college students with mutual benefits. Singapore is building retirement villages and multi-generation jumbo government housing again.
4. In some societies like Japan, the young with unstable part time job with low pay and no pension develops resentment of the old who they are supporting. The same is happening in the West; it’s notoriously difficult to cut benefits so it is going to the biggest challenge for this century. However one thing is certain: benefits will be given later, and less will be given
June 20, 2020
How should we live longer better?
1) Acknowledge the new demographics: women are released from the tyranny of having to give birth, marriage rates are down, employment up and people live longer
2) You are younger than you think. Acknowledge the young-old vs old-old and extend middle age to somewhere in your 70s
3) Exercise and eat your broccoli
4) Keep working (the value pensioners bring to the economy in terms of childcare, tutoring, etc is vast and a accounted for!)
5) Exercise your brain. Neuroplasticity continues til death- old brains can learn new tricks
6) Be wealthy: then you can afford to throw money at Gene therapy and all those West coast inspired longevity supplements
7) Stay networked and have friends
8) Revolutionise healthcare - from hospital factories that treat an event to something more holistic and systemic, tech supported and financed fairly by all
9) Find your purpose and follow it (my mum is a great example of this)
10) Let's write a new social contract. Let's face it: childhood lasts until your 25 at today's prices and debt levels. We've got 4 generations working in the same teams. We need to change our thinking about age, share best practices with other countries, and start doing as we want to be done by. Today's inequalities do not bode well for living better longer: you still need to be better educated and wealthier to really benefit from all of the above. But it doesn't have to be, if we continue to chip away at the real problems.
1) Acknowledge the new demographics: women are released from the tyranny of having to give birth, marriage rates are down, employment up and people live longer
2) You are younger than you think. Acknowledge the young-old vs old-old and extend middle age to somewhere in your 70s
3) Exercise and eat your broccoli
4) Keep working (the value pensioners bring to the economy in terms of childcare, tutoring, etc is vast and a accounted for!)
5) Exercise your brain. Neuroplasticity continues til death- old brains can learn new tricks
6) Be wealthy: then you can afford to throw money at Gene therapy and all those West coast inspired longevity supplements
7) Stay networked and have friends
8) Revolutionise healthcare - from hospital factories that treat an event to something more holistic and systemic, tech supported and financed fairly by all
9) Find your purpose and follow it (my mum is a great example of this)
10) Let's write a new social contract. Let's face it: childhood lasts until your 25 at today's prices and debt levels. We've got 4 generations working in the same teams. We need to change our thinking about age, share best practices with other countries, and start doing as we want to be done by. Today's inequalities do not bode well for living better longer: you still need to be better educated and wealthier to really benefit from all of the above. But it doesn't have to be, if we continue to chip away at the real problems.
January 1, 2020
For someone just a month away from retiring himself, this book couldn't have come to my notice at a better time. It makes a strong case that good health and "middle" age both can and should continue as long as possible, regardless of retirement status.
The book has given me a number of ideas and tasks to think about as I begin retirement next month, and will quite possibly be highly influential in how my next few years work out.
The book has given me a number of ideas and tasks to think about as I begin retirement next month, and will quite possibly be highly influential in how my next few years work out.
August 18, 2019
As a Baby Boomer ,I found this book a very enjoyable and enlightening read.
It made me think of the extra time we all have if we look after ourselves.
It made me think of the extra time we all have if we look after ourselves.
September 13, 2025
LOVE THIS BOOK. TEN SIMPLE TRUTHS
Found this very cool summary.
1. We need to realize that demography will shift culture and the balance of power
“By 2020, for the first time in history, there will be more people on the planet over 65 than under 5. More grandparents than grandchildren.” As children become scarce, families and networks of solidarity are changing. Our age pyramid is changing all the faster as “babies have gone out of fashion” in a lot of countries, particularly Japan. The roots of many of these changes lie in a feminist revolution: “Women are shaking off the traditions of dutiful service to husband and household and challenging men to adapt.”
If you want to catch a glimpse of our demographic future, look at Japan, writes Cavendish. Many more people there than anywhere else remain single all their lives. Japan may be a few years ahead of other countries, but it isn’t a demographic outlier. China is aging very fast: “China’s working-age population has been in decline since 2012 and is set to fall by almost a quarter by 2050 . . . By mid-century, China’s population could look much more like Japan’s—but without Japan’s affluence.” Many experts predict that China’s population will shrink quickly after 2029. As for Europe, birth rates have been low for three decades. As a consequence of high youth unemployment, Italy holds the record for the lowest birth rate in Europe.
Meanwhile, life expectancy has grown throughout the 20th century: “Between 1970 and 2011 . . . life expectancy at 65 increased 20 times as fast as in the previous century. The main reason? A massive drop in deaths from heart attack and stroke, driven by people giving up cigarettes.” These changes will transform the balance of power between countries, which are at different stages of their demographic transition and between generations within countries.
2. You are younger than you think: the stages of life are changing
Our society is aging but we are also redefining what it means to be 50, 60, or 70. In fact, every stage of our lives is being redefined. For example, the stage of adolescence lasts much longer. “The stage of adolescence should last until 24. That’s the average age at which children now move out of the family home in the UK.” It is not old age that is getting longer, Cavendish explains, it is middle age. For example, in the US, an overwhelming majority (75%) of people between 60 and 75 have no cognitive or physical impairment. Fewer people develop dementia than ever before in history. We used to believe that dementia was inevitable in old age. It isn’t.
Japan, which has the oldest population in the world, is already taking cognizance of this new reality by distinguishing between the “young-old”––those who are healthy, independent, and active––and the “old-old”––those who are frail and need help. More “young-old” people continue to work, keep active, retain a sense of purpose, and connect with other people. “We are witnessing a decoupling between biological age and chronological age. Extra Time has given us an entirely new stage of life: the stage of the “Young-Old”. We need . . . to stop lumping everyone from 60 to 100 together, and accept that it is normal to be vibrant and capable in your seventies.”
Although it doesn’t mean the same to be 65 today, most pension systems are still based on the idea that that’s when you should retire. “Right across Europe, retirement ages are not keeping pace with life expectancy.” Recruiters and media continue to use out-of-date stereotypes that are disparaging to people over 50 years old. Our language often turns people into “sub-humans, lesser beings”. There is a casualness to ageism that makes it all the more harmful. Advertising, for example, feeds off the idea that we are in a “constant battle” against old age.
The majority of people underestimate how long they are going to live because we base our expectations on the lives of our grandparents. There are stark inequalities when it comes to life expectancy, however. Education remains the strongest predictor of lifespan. “It is not clear why education is so vital. Some experts argue that education is formative. It may make us better at planning and exercising self-control, which may feed into healthier lifestyle choices. It also affects the kinds of jobs we do.”
3. If exercise were a pill, we’d all be taking it
There are stark differences in terms of biological age, though genes account for only a small part. Our biological fate depends mostly on environmental factors such as “what we eat and drink, how stressful our lives are, whether we live amid pollution, whether we exercise (and how often)”. Many studies have been published over the past three decades about exercise as a “miracle cure” for chronic disease and physical deterioration.
Unfortunately, sedentary lifestyles are increasingly common. Sitting is the new smoking, many scientists say. (The lockdowns that came as part of the pandemic may have a lasting effect on our health as we were told not to move about so much). We may be confusing the harmful impact of a sedentary lifestyle with what normal aging is all about. “We confuse the effects of true aging with what is mainly a loss of fitness, caused by too little activity.”
There are four aspects of fitness that need to be improved: strength, stamina, suppleness, and skill. All of these combined can help to prevent all sorts of physical and mental problems. But for the benefits of exercise to be real, we need to challenge ourselves at every age and not “relax” even at 80 or 90. Exercise, however, is not as easy as just taking a pill. It isn’t supported by a multi-billion-pound industry with strong lobbying power in the form of Big Pharma. And it requires a deep understanding of behavior and motivation.
Unfortunately, high levels of obesity are knocking years off people’s lives. The population of the US is the fattest of all industrialized nations and life expectancy has stopped rising there. Obesity and sedentary lifestyles are making longevity and healthy aging increasingly unequal. These are problems that are not addressed by our healthcare systems, which were historically “set up to treat disease, not to preserve health”.
4. For some people, it may make sense to postpone retirement
Retiring at 65 may seem desirable, but the truth is that it does not necessarily make people happy. “What if retirement can make you old?” asks Cavendish. The loss of purpose and recognition, lack of social life, boredom, and inactivity that often come with retirement can make many people unhappy. In Japan, the Silver Centre movement was created to restore a sense of purpose and connection to older citizens. “The first Silver Centre was founded in 1975 by a Tokyo University professor and some retired friends who wanted to supplement their income, maintain their health, and contribute to society. . . Your salary isn’t everything: having a place to shine matters.”
We often underestimate the contribution of older entrepreneurs and employees. In the United States, 55- to 65-year-olds are 65% more likely to start a business than 20- to 34-year-olds––and they have a higher rate of success too. Venture capitalists who invest in start-ups should not miss out on these enterprises: there’s no business case for ageism. More and more people choose to “unretire”––ie go back to work––after they’re supposed to have retired. “One in four Americans and Brits now ‘unretire’ after having officially retired. Their reasons are both financial and psychological.” They are often highly educated. Of course, unretirement makes more sense to those who love their job. If you hate your job, you’ll benefit more from giving up work.
Discrimination in the labor market is making it harder for many people who would like to continue working. “In 2018, a UK parliamentary committee concluded that the talents of more than a million people over 50 are being wasted, because of bias and outdated hiring practices.” This is bound to cause massive problems. In fact, countries with aging populations, such as Germany and Japan, need more elderly people to continue working if they are to address the huge shortage of talent.
The idea that older workers are inevitably less productive is false. Minor ergonomic and organizational adjustments can go a long way to maintain or boost productivity beyond expectations. In Germany, for example, BMW made some adjustments with great success. Also “a true meritocracy of continuous learning” should be created to develop and leverage potential in every age group.
5. To keep in shape, your brain will have to keep learning
Neuroscientists tell us that our brains are more plastic than had been believed. Memory loss is not inevitable. The brain is not fixed in adulthood: “We are continually remolding the connections between our brain cells as we experience the world and our behavior can actually change our brains.” It’s a case of “use it or lose it”. By learning something new, changing our environment, and seeking stimulation, we can keep our adult brains plastic. “Regular heavy-lifting produces lasting improvements.” Age doesn’t have to be a barrier to learning. There is every reason to continue to invest in your learning and to challenge yourself.
6. Anti-aging drugs are making progress
Exercise and diet have significantly more impact than drugs, but there have been stunning medical advances. There’s a “gold rush for immortality” in Silicon Valley, for example, where scientists are working on reducing the time we spend in the “old-old” stage. Entrepreneurs and the self-obsessed, who love to quantify and measure everything, are trying every new fad, such as fasting and calorie restriction, and gathering precious data to help scientists learn more. Scientists are also working on the genetics of aging. “There are genes for aging . . . and these genes can be manipulated.” Most agree that humankind faces a biological age limit of probably about 120 years. But we shouldn’t look at our experience of aging as immutable. Many more discoveries can help to push physical limits that we previously thought couldn’t be moved.
7. Everyone needs a neighborhood
“The key to healthy aging is relationships, relationships, relationships,” according to George Vaillant, a psychiatrist, and professor at Harvard Medical School. In the old days, the neighborhood was where you could feel safe and develop relationships. But our modern lifestyles are making people feel more lonely. In the UK, more than one-third of people over 65 live alone. The figures are more or less the same in a lot of countries. Those who live in homes for the elderly are often dehumanized. The death rate in such homes during the pandemic illustrates this in a tragic way.
That’s why new communities are emerging around the globe to offer elderly people more of a “neighborhood”. In Denmark and the Netherlands, for example, groups of individuals came together in “co-housing” developments in the 1960s. New housing alternatives are based on the idea that different generations should be mixed. What if students could “bring the outside world in?” Cavendish asks. “The ‘Young-Old’ do not want a quiet life, they want to live like they mean it. The ‘Old-Old’ do not wish to be warehoused and bossed around, they want to remain the authors of their own lives. What everyone needs is a neighborhood, preferably designed with their input. The clear benefits from social connections and community mean that it should be in the interests of governments to facilitate co-housing.”
8. We need a care revolution––with or without robots
In most countries, care work is undervalued, underpaid, and draining. Yet, Cavendish writes, it is actually highly skilled. As our population ages, we are going to need more and more carers but we will find it increasingly hard to recruit them. There is already a huge shortage of carers in Europe. Bureaucracy and division of labor have dehumanized health care. “Too many people find themselves pinging between different medical silos, with long waits, having to repeat their story every time. And there is an almost total disconnect between the health service and long-term ‘social care’.”
Cavendish dedicates several pages to the Buurtzorg “revolution” in the Netherlands: “This is what happens when you put humanity before bureaucracy.” Buurtzorg is a Dutch healthcare organization, founded in 2007, that empowers nurses to make their own decisions with each patient. They work in small teams of 10 to 12 and Buurtzorg’s head office is limited to a small team that handles IT and payroll. The Buurtzorg model works incredibly well for three reasons: first, continuity of care; second, the reliance on family networks; third, the absence of divisions of labor. In other systems, a lot of resources are devoted to allocating tasks to the cheapest member of staff, which is a “false economy”.
“Treating people as human, building proper relationships, and paying those who have a vocation, for what I would call the ‘craftsmanship’ of nursing, may sound like common sense. But in today’s world, it’s radical. Health systems are still organized to treat yesterday’s problems. Our post-war systems are still largely geared to fixing one-time illnesses, rather than predicting, preventing, and treating chronic long-term conditions.”
9. Finding Ikigai: purpose is vital
“Extra Time should be a gift,” writes Cavendish. But if you have nothing to do with that time, no purpose, and no neighborhood, it’s not. “We humans need a purpose to live fulfilling lives.” Studies show that old people who have a sense of purpose are happier and healthier. The Japanese Silver Centres mentioned above are organized around the concept of Ikigai, which has found its way into numerous self-help books. Ikigai merges the spiritual and practical. It connects work, family, duty, and passions.
A popular Venn diagram shows Ikigai as the intersection between “that which you love”, “that which the world needs”, “that which you can be paid for” and “that which you are good at”. For many people, Ikigai comes from helping others. In communities where the elderly find ways to help others, there’s more Ikigai. The author gives the beautiful example of Zimbabwe’s “friendship benches” where grandmothers help people from the village––and apparently are better at treating depression than qualified doctors. “Doing good makes you feel good.”
The contributions of more elderly people could solve many of the problems we have, such as the shortage of teachers and nurses, and increased loneliness and isolation. “Dedicated volunteers can also make a real, measurable difference to public services.”
10. We need a new social contract
“For the past 50 years, citizens growing up in industrialized countries have enjoyed an implicit social contract: work hard and pay tax, and you can expect rising living standards, a safety net if things go wrong, and a pension . . . But it is now under threat.” More and more young people today in Europe and the United States no longer expect to receive a pension when they grow old. The ratio of active to inactive citizens is stretching our systems in a way that will soon be unsustainable. The demographic shift, together with a dramatic increase in wealth inequality, challenges intergenerational transfers and the social contract in novel ways. We shouldn’t let current generations claim the resources of future generations. This is likely to become the social and political issues of this century.
Found this very cool summary.
1. We need to realize that demography will shift culture and the balance of power
“By 2020, for the first time in history, there will be more people on the planet over 65 than under 5. More grandparents than grandchildren.” As children become scarce, families and networks of solidarity are changing. Our age pyramid is changing all the faster as “babies have gone out of fashion” in a lot of countries, particularly Japan. The roots of many of these changes lie in a feminist revolution: “Women are shaking off the traditions of dutiful service to husband and household and challenging men to adapt.”
If you want to catch a glimpse of our demographic future, look at Japan, writes Cavendish. Many more people there than anywhere else remain single all their lives. Japan may be a few years ahead of other countries, but it isn’t a demographic outlier. China is aging very fast: “China’s working-age population has been in decline since 2012 and is set to fall by almost a quarter by 2050 . . . By mid-century, China’s population could look much more like Japan’s—but without Japan’s affluence.” Many experts predict that China’s population will shrink quickly after 2029. As for Europe, birth rates have been low for three decades. As a consequence of high youth unemployment, Italy holds the record for the lowest birth rate in Europe.
Meanwhile, life expectancy has grown throughout the 20th century: “Between 1970 and 2011 . . . life expectancy at 65 increased 20 times as fast as in the previous century. The main reason? A massive drop in deaths from heart attack and stroke, driven by people giving up cigarettes.” These changes will transform the balance of power between countries, which are at different stages of their demographic transition and between generations within countries.
2. You are younger than you think: the stages of life are changing
Our society is aging but we are also redefining what it means to be 50, 60, or 70. In fact, every stage of our lives is being redefined. For example, the stage of adolescence lasts much longer. “The stage of adolescence should last until 24. That’s the average age at which children now move out of the family home in the UK.” It is not old age that is getting longer, Cavendish explains, it is middle age. For example, in the US, an overwhelming majority (75%) of people between 60 and 75 have no cognitive or physical impairment. Fewer people develop dementia than ever before in history. We used to believe that dementia was inevitable in old age. It isn’t.
Japan, which has the oldest population in the world, is already taking cognizance of this new reality by distinguishing between the “young-old”––those who are healthy, independent, and active––and the “old-old”––those who are frail and need help. More “young-old” people continue to work, keep active, retain a sense of purpose, and connect with other people. “We are witnessing a decoupling between biological age and chronological age. Extra Time has given us an entirely new stage of life: the stage of the “Young-Old”. We need . . . to stop lumping everyone from 60 to 100 together, and accept that it is normal to be vibrant and capable in your seventies.”
Although it doesn’t mean the same to be 65 today, most pension systems are still based on the idea that that’s when you should retire. “Right across Europe, retirement ages are not keeping pace with life expectancy.” Recruiters and media continue to use out-of-date stereotypes that are disparaging to people over 50 years old. Our language often turns people into “sub-humans, lesser beings”. There is a casualness to ageism that makes it all the more harmful. Advertising, for example, feeds off the idea that we are in a “constant battle” against old age.
The majority of people underestimate how long they are going to live because we base our expectations on the lives of our grandparents. There are stark inequalities when it comes to life expectancy, however. Education remains the strongest predictor of lifespan. “It is not clear why education is so vital. Some experts argue that education is formative. It may make us better at planning and exercising self-control, which may feed into healthier lifestyle choices. It also affects the kinds of jobs we do.”
3. If exercise were a pill, we’d all be taking it
There are stark differences in terms of biological age, though genes account for only a small part. Our biological fate depends mostly on environmental factors such as “what we eat and drink, how stressful our lives are, whether we live amid pollution, whether we exercise (and how often)”. Many studies have been published over the past three decades about exercise as a “miracle cure” for chronic disease and physical deterioration.
Unfortunately, sedentary lifestyles are increasingly common. Sitting is the new smoking, many scientists say. (The lockdowns that came as part of the pandemic may have a lasting effect on our health as we were told not to move about so much). We may be confusing the harmful impact of a sedentary lifestyle with what normal aging is all about. “We confuse the effects of true aging with what is mainly a loss of fitness, caused by too little activity.”
There are four aspects of fitness that need to be improved: strength, stamina, suppleness, and skill. All of these combined can help to prevent all sorts of physical and mental problems. But for the benefits of exercise to be real, we need to challenge ourselves at every age and not “relax” even at 80 or 90. Exercise, however, is not as easy as just taking a pill. It isn’t supported by a multi-billion-pound industry with strong lobbying power in the form of Big Pharma. And it requires a deep understanding of behavior and motivation.
Unfortunately, high levels of obesity are knocking years off people’s lives. The population of the US is the fattest of all industrialized nations and life expectancy has stopped rising there. Obesity and sedentary lifestyles are making longevity and healthy aging increasingly unequal. These are problems that are not addressed by our healthcare systems, which were historically “set up to treat disease, not to preserve health”.
4. For some people, it may make sense to postpone retirement
Retiring at 65 may seem desirable, but the truth is that it does not necessarily make people happy. “What if retirement can make you old?” asks Cavendish. The loss of purpose and recognition, lack of social life, boredom, and inactivity that often come with retirement can make many people unhappy. In Japan, the Silver Centre movement was created to restore a sense of purpose and connection to older citizens. “The first Silver Centre was founded in 1975 by a Tokyo University professor and some retired friends who wanted to supplement their income, maintain their health, and contribute to society. . . Your salary isn’t everything: having a place to shine matters.”
We often underestimate the contribution of older entrepreneurs and employees. In the United States, 55- to 65-year-olds are 65% more likely to start a business than 20- to 34-year-olds––and they have a higher rate of success too. Venture capitalists who invest in start-ups should not miss out on these enterprises: there’s no business case for ageism. More and more people choose to “unretire”––ie go back to work––after they’re supposed to have retired. “One in four Americans and Brits now ‘unretire’ after having officially retired. Their reasons are both financial and psychological.” They are often highly educated. Of course, unretirement makes more sense to those who love their job. If you hate your job, you’ll benefit more from giving up work.
Discrimination in the labor market is making it harder for many people who would like to continue working. “In 2018, a UK parliamentary committee concluded that the talents of more than a million people over 50 are being wasted, because of bias and outdated hiring practices.” This is bound to cause massive problems. In fact, countries with aging populations, such as Germany and Japan, need more elderly people to continue working if they are to address the huge shortage of talent.
The idea that older workers are inevitably less productive is false. Minor ergonomic and organizational adjustments can go a long way to maintain or boost productivity beyond expectations. In Germany, for example, BMW made some adjustments with great success. Also “a true meritocracy of continuous learning” should be created to develop and leverage potential in every age group.
5. To keep in shape, your brain will have to keep learning
Neuroscientists tell us that our brains are more plastic than had been believed. Memory loss is not inevitable. The brain is not fixed in adulthood: “We are continually remolding the connections between our brain cells as we experience the world and our behavior can actually change our brains.” It’s a case of “use it or lose it”. By learning something new, changing our environment, and seeking stimulation, we can keep our adult brains plastic. “Regular heavy-lifting produces lasting improvements.” Age doesn’t have to be a barrier to learning. There is every reason to continue to invest in your learning and to challenge yourself.
6. Anti-aging drugs are making progress
Exercise and diet have significantly more impact than drugs, but there have been stunning medical advances. There’s a “gold rush for immortality” in Silicon Valley, for example, where scientists are working on reducing the time we spend in the “old-old” stage. Entrepreneurs and the self-obsessed, who love to quantify and measure everything, are trying every new fad, such as fasting and calorie restriction, and gathering precious data to help scientists learn more. Scientists are also working on the genetics of aging. “There are genes for aging . . . and these genes can be manipulated.” Most agree that humankind faces a biological age limit of probably about 120 years. But we shouldn’t look at our experience of aging as immutable. Many more discoveries can help to push physical limits that we previously thought couldn’t be moved.
7. Everyone needs a neighborhood
“The key to healthy aging is relationships, relationships, relationships,” according to George Vaillant, a psychiatrist, and professor at Harvard Medical School. In the old days, the neighborhood was where you could feel safe and develop relationships. But our modern lifestyles are making people feel more lonely. In the UK, more than one-third of people over 65 live alone. The figures are more or less the same in a lot of countries. Those who live in homes for the elderly are often dehumanized. The death rate in such homes during the pandemic illustrates this in a tragic way.
That’s why new communities are emerging around the globe to offer elderly people more of a “neighborhood”. In Denmark and the Netherlands, for example, groups of individuals came together in “co-housing” developments in the 1960s. New housing alternatives are based on the idea that different generations should be mixed. What if students could “bring the outside world in?” Cavendish asks. “The ‘Young-Old’ do not want a quiet life, they want to live like they mean it. The ‘Old-Old’ do not wish to be warehoused and bossed around, they want to remain the authors of their own lives. What everyone needs is a neighborhood, preferably designed with their input. The clear benefits from social connections and community mean that it should be in the interests of governments to facilitate co-housing.”
8. We need a care revolution––with or without robots
In most countries, care work is undervalued, underpaid, and draining. Yet, Cavendish writes, it is actually highly skilled. As our population ages, we are going to need more and more carers but we will find it increasingly hard to recruit them. There is already a huge shortage of carers in Europe. Bureaucracy and division of labor have dehumanized health care. “Too many people find themselves pinging between different medical silos, with long waits, having to repeat their story every time. And there is an almost total disconnect between the health service and long-term ‘social care’.”
Cavendish dedicates several pages to the Buurtzorg “revolution” in the Netherlands: “This is what happens when you put humanity before bureaucracy.” Buurtzorg is a Dutch healthcare organization, founded in 2007, that empowers nurses to make their own decisions with each patient. They work in small teams of 10 to 12 and Buurtzorg’s head office is limited to a small team that handles IT and payroll. The Buurtzorg model works incredibly well for three reasons: first, continuity of care; second, the reliance on family networks; third, the absence of divisions of labor. In other systems, a lot of resources are devoted to allocating tasks to the cheapest member of staff, which is a “false economy”.
“Treating people as human, building proper relationships, and paying those who have a vocation, for what I would call the ‘craftsmanship’ of nursing, may sound like common sense. But in today’s world, it’s radical. Health systems are still organized to treat yesterday’s problems. Our post-war systems are still largely geared to fixing one-time illnesses, rather than predicting, preventing, and treating chronic long-term conditions.”
9. Finding Ikigai: purpose is vital
“Extra Time should be a gift,” writes Cavendish. But if you have nothing to do with that time, no purpose, and no neighborhood, it’s not. “We humans need a purpose to live fulfilling lives.” Studies show that old people who have a sense of purpose are happier and healthier. The Japanese Silver Centres mentioned above are organized around the concept of Ikigai, which has found its way into numerous self-help books. Ikigai merges the spiritual and practical. It connects work, family, duty, and passions.
A popular Venn diagram shows Ikigai as the intersection between “that which you love”, “that which the world needs”, “that which you can be paid for” and “that which you are good at”. For many people, Ikigai comes from helping others. In communities where the elderly find ways to help others, there’s more Ikigai. The author gives the beautiful example of Zimbabwe’s “friendship benches” where grandmothers help people from the village––and apparently are better at treating depression than qualified doctors. “Doing good makes you feel good.”
The contributions of more elderly people could solve many of the problems we have, such as the shortage of teachers and nurses, and increased loneliness and isolation. “Dedicated volunteers can also make a real, measurable difference to public services.”
10. We need a new social contract
“For the past 50 years, citizens growing up in industrialized countries have enjoyed an implicit social contract: work hard and pay tax, and you can expect rising living standards, a safety net if things go wrong, and a pension . . . But it is now under threat.” More and more young people today in Europe and the United States no longer expect to receive a pension when they grow old. The ratio of active to inactive citizens is stretching our systems in a way that will soon be unsustainable. The demographic shift, together with a dramatic increase in wealth inequality, challenges intergenerational transfers and the social contract in novel ways. We shouldn’t let current generations claim the resources of future generations. This is likely to become the social and political issues of this century.
April 10, 2020
A surprisingly good book I was lucky enough to stumble upon. It is a very necessary conversation considering the radical changes taking place in our population and their impacts on society.
Cavendish pointed out different stigmas against the word "old" itself, where they stem from as well as plausible approaches to, maybe, do our part for the generations that brought us here.
Cavendish pointed out different stigmas against the word "old" itself, where they stem from as well as plausible approaches to, maybe, do our part for the generations that brought us here.
July 4, 2020
Excellent read as can be seen by my five star. Maybe I enjoyed it because it is relevant to me at my age.
August 27, 2025
A factor in my book ratings is, among else, the number of highlights I have made in a book by the time I finish it, and here we stand at a staggering 216 highlights over de facto 221 pages. The book is YELLOW, so here we go.
Questions answered:
The book is doing an excellent job at touching on a vast array of aspects around the fact that collectively, we keep getting older (and oftentimes remain in better health along the way). It answers questions such as:
- How did life expectancy increase in the first place, and by what means will we increase it in the future?
- What are the implications of an ageing population on our national pension systems and the generational contracts in place in many countries?
- What are starting points to defuse the demographic time bomb? How do we secure a liveable old age for an increasing number of increasingly old people without compromising the future of the young by bankrupting them?
- What can people do to increase their health span, next to their life span? (Some of those sports facts amazed me! See down below in the quotes)
- What does the latest research around brain plasticity and neurogenesis tell us about maintaining or even advancing our mental capacities as we age?
- What is the current state of gene research and what does it tell us about ageing (chronological vs. biological age)? How does systemic inflammation tie into that last miserable stretch of our lifespan that we hope to shorten, or ideally, avoid entirely?
- How can advances in AI and Machine Learning help us age better rather than just live longer?
- How do current regulations to the pharmaceutical industry hinder bringing effective anti-ageing drugs to market, and how can we better support ongoing research?
- How does our modern social context contribute to ageing, and what novel concepts are introduced to mitigate negative effects? (loved that part!)
Content Highlights:
- The best part has to be the thoroughly encouraging tone of the book: retired people have a world to offer to their communities, we just need to come up with good concepts to scale it; ageing is not a linear process and a lot of how old age plays out can lie in our hands; retirement doesn't have to be bleak, and there are powerful ways to organise to create the spaces needed for communities to flourish. It's a book that doesn't just lament the problem but suggests actual solutions.
- You truly get a 360 degree perspective on every aspect of Extra Time; we touch on health and lifestyle, economics, politics, society, science and technology. I was amazed at how much oomph can fit into just over 200 pages.
- The author does a great job at looking at successfully and less successfully aging populations around the globe; next to the obvious choices of the US and the UK, we get a glimpse into success concepts around handling the problem of ageing societies in Japan, China, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy and Sub-Saharan Africa. Here something interesting picked up along the way:
"Sub-Saharan Africa finds itself in a demographic bind of a different sort. Its population is expected to quadruple to 4 billion people by 2100, with Nigeria overtaking America as the world’s third most populous country. There is much excitement at the prospect of youth burgeoning as the old world shrinks. Tanzanian President John Magufuli has claimed he sees no need for birth control, insisting a high fertility rate will boost his country’s economy. Sadly, he may be mistaken. The great leaps forward made by the Asian Tiger economies came from the so-called ‘demographic dividend’: of rapid growth in working-age populations, enabling those countries to grow fast and invest, followed by sharp subsequent falls in the birth rate which boosted the skills base, because parents with fewer children could invest more in educating each one."
Key Insights:
- Currently most underrated, one of the most important keys to ageing well are maintaining quality relationships and overall social capital.
- Contrary to popular belief, you are never too old to learn (there are strong learners in every age group) - we now know that there are solid things you can do to maintain your brain plasticity well into old age, chiefly by continuously challenging your brain with activities requiring an intense focus; for example, two areas where there has been robust research are learning a foreign language and playing a musical instrument.
- A higher level of education can help maintain brain plasticity and in turn help starve off degenerative cognitive disease for longer: "This doesn’t mean a professor can’t get Alzheimer’s, but it does suggest that brains which are plastic may be able to re-order themselves to resist its ravages for longer. Studies have suggested that people with higher cognitive reserve may be better at staving off Parkinson’s disease and stroke, as well as dementia."
- The main tenets of ageing well on an individual level are: stay active (notably focusing on the four aspects of fitness: strength, stamina, suppleness and skill), retain your sense of purpose and connect with people, next to nutrition (I quote: "A good basic rule is that what’s good for the heart is generally good for the brain. That means eating oodles of vegetables and fruit, plenty of fibre and avoiding processed foods as much as possible.), limiting stress which includes getting enough sleep, and avoiding excessive pollution, from environmental factors as well as consumption-based ones (e.g. smoking, drinking, etc.).
- Two of the most prominent predictors of old age enjoyed in good health on a population scale are, unfortunately, level of education and (unsurprisingly) income level - if you think about it, it ties into all aspects mentioned above.
- Current retirement ages cannot be sustained: "If current trends continue, some of us living in Europe, parts of Asia and North America could spend a quarter of our lives retired. That is crazy. (...) In 1950, average male life expectancy at 65 was 12 years. By the time we were looking at it, in 2003, it was 20 years. Life expectancy at 65 could be another 35 years by the time we reach mid-century. We should have started increasing the pension age years before.’"Longevity economists Andrew Mason and Ronald Lee have calculated that if people in the ‘older countries’, like Germany, Japan and Spain, were to delay retirement by 2.5 years per decade between 2010 and 2050, that would be sufficient to offset the economic effects of demographic changes.
- The housing crisis and a lack of communities for the elderly are two sides of the same coin; many older people would prefer to move out of their larger homes, however we lack affordable and attractive spaces imbued with a sense of community - "If we could build better housing for older people, we could free up much-needed space for younger ones"
- The dire state of long-term care services (not to be confused with healthcare services), I really had no idea just how bad it was; the book looks at social insurance schemes as pioneered in Germany and Japan.
- Interestingly, your chance of dying stops increasing on a year-by-year basis after age 105 (whether you want to get to that age is an entirely different question...).
The book doesn't fail to pose some tough questions:
Do we truly need anti-ageing research for the well-off, in a world still plagued by TB and malaria?
Do we set the wrong incentives by making access to prescription drugs easier, while keeping steep pay-walls in place for prophylactic maintenance like gyms, physiotherapy, and quality nutrition?
If high earners are set to become much older than the average person, and on top of that receive much higher pension payments for longer, should we introduce corrective measures to ease the tax burden on current generations and maintain a level of fairness compared to blue collar workers?
Great Success Stories mentioned that I don't want to spoiler and cannot paste without making this review even more tediously long:
the Geisinger health centre in Shamokin, Pennsylvania and their Fresh Food Farmacy - Southwark Circle in South London - the Village in Boston - retirement villages in Australia and the US - Germany's multi-generation homes (Mehrgenerationenhäuser) with grandparent service - HomeShare in Australia - Humanitas Deventer in the Netherlands (the latter two are thriving co-housing initiatives between pensioners and students) - Buurtzorg in the Netherlands as an improved concept to conventional care services - the Friendship Benches of Zimbabwe
Favourite Quotes:
What if, instead of defining people by how many birthdays they’ve enjoyed, we define them by how many years they have left? Obviously, that’s hypothetical. None of us can know individually when we will meet our end. But we do know the average. And if we apply that average, things look different. If we defined old age as having 15 years or less left to live, we wouldn’t call many baby boomers ‘old’ until they hit 74. Up to that point they’d be middle-aged.
People who have climbed every ladder life presented, bravely meeting challenges along the way, suddenly find themselves with no more rungs to climb and no compass. What is supposed to be a pleasant time of life can be quietly traumatic. That is why I feel so strongly that older people should not be made to give up work and that we must challenge the narrative of ‘golden’ early retirement.
Extra Time has given us an entirely new stage of life: the stage of the ‘Young-Old’. We need to catch up with this new reality, stop lumping everyone from 60 to 100 together, and accept that it is normal to be vibrant and capable in your seventies.
On the importance of staying active: Lazarus is not just a biking fanatic, he is also emeritus professor at King’s College London, where he has co-authored a study into amateur endurance cyclists like himself. The older cyclists in the study – aged between 55 and 79 – were found to have similar immune systems, strength, muscle mass and cholesterol levels as those who were only in their twenties. The King’s researchers believe that endurance sports, including cycling, swimming and running, may protect the immune system by boosting the number of T-cells in our blood. These protective white blood cells are thought to decline by about 2 per cent a year from our twenties onwards, making us gradually more susceptible to infections and conditions like rheumatoid arthritis. But the older endurance cyclists had almost as many T-cells as 20-year-olds – a protective effect that no medicine yet invented can provide.
and
Stunning results have been seen in an otherwise normal group of American septuagenarians who started running when it became fashionable during the 1970s, and stayed hooked. Over the next 50 years some went on jogging, others took up cycling or swimming or working out, but they did it regularly – and as a hobby, not to compete. To the amazement of the researchers, the muscle strength of these seventy-somethings was almost indistinguishable from 25-year-olds, with as many capillaries and enzymes. Their aerobic capacity was 40 per cent higher than people of their age who were not regular exercisers. The researchers at Ball State University, Indiana, concluded this made both the men and the women biologically 30 years younger than their chronological age.
According to the Harvard Business Review (HBR), older entrepreneurs actually have a much higher success rate than younger ones. The average age of founders of the highest-growth start-ups in the US is now 45, which rises to 47 if you remove social media but keep biotech.
Many ambitious people have their feet clamped so hard on the career accelerator that they have too little time for their families in their thirties, only to get spat out at 60 when they’ve still got plenty of energy and their children don’t need them any more.
When ageing is thought to be immutable, it creates an unusual hurdle for scientists trying to bring anti-ageing drugs to market. Regulators will only license drugs which target defined diseases. Ageing itself is not defined as a disease, because regulators do not think of ageing as something which is treatable, let alone curable. However this makes it difficult to persuade pharmaceutical companies to invest, as they may not get a licence to sell their inventions.
‘We need to shuffle the pack and get younger people into the larger homes, and older people into lovely, purpose-built accommodation without stairs,’ says Lord Richard Best, social housing expert and former chair of Hanover Housing Association. ‘In England, 4.2 million pensioners own properties with two bedrooms they don’t use. If just 2 per cent of them moved out, this could free up 85,000 homes for families who need houses with gardens. Do that every year for ten years and we could house 4 million people!’
(...)legendary work done in one nursing home by the psychologists Ellen Langer and Judith Rodin. The residents were each given a houseplant for their room. Half were told a nurse would look after it, the other half were told they were responsible for it. The improvements in mental and physical wellbeing of the second group were so considerable that, 18 months later, they were only half as likely as the first group to have died.
Taken together, this means that many rich countries are now at a point when ‘an unprecedented claim on economic resources by the oldest generation’ is said to be ‘threatening the social contract between the generations and prospects for continued economic growth’.
Throughout history, transfers have flowed downwards, from old to young. But population ageing has led to a steady decrease in the strength of this downward pattern. In Japan, Germany, Austria, Slovenia and Hungary, rich nations with some of the oldest populations, Lee and Mason find that the direction of transfers has been reversed, probably for the first time in history. This means that current generations are now claiming the resources of future generations. (...)
Many people who have worked hard and paid taxes believe they are entitled to ‘take out’ what they’ve ‘paid in’. Unfortunately, it’s not quite that simple. In pay-as-you-go welfare systems, today’s workers don’t put their taxes into a pot labelled with their name, waiting to be retrieved when they need it. Their taxes are paying the benefits of today’s retirees. UK national insurance contributions and US payroll taxes are invested in government bonds, whose value depends on the ability of future taxpayers to service them. The problem is that baby boomers are set to take out considerably more than they ever paid in, partly by just living longer.
Further reading on the topics of ageing, health span vs. life span and the factors impacting both:
How Not to Age: The Scientific Approach to Getting Healthier as You Get Older
The Village Effect
Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams (I'll never not recommend this one)
Extreme Measures: Finding a Better Path to the End of Life
Aging with Grace: What the Nun Study Teaches Us About Leading Longer, Healthier, and More Meaningful Lives
The Obesity Code: Unlocking the Secrets of Weight Loss
Fiber Fueled: The Plant-Based Gut Health Program for Losing Weight, Restoring Your Health, and Optimizing Your Microbiome
[German] Wechselhafte Jahre - Schriftstellerinnen übers Älterwerden
Questions answered:
The book is doing an excellent job at touching on a vast array of aspects around the fact that collectively, we keep getting older (and oftentimes remain in better health along the way). It answers questions such as:
- How did life expectancy increase in the first place, and by what means will we increase it in the future?
- What are the implications of an ageing population on our national pension systems and the generational contracts in place in many countries?
- What are starting points to defuse the demographic time bomb? How do we secure a liveable old age for an increasing number of increasingly old people without compromising the future of the young by bankrupting them?
- What can people do to increase their health span, next to their life span? (Some of those sports facts amazed me! See down below in the quotes)
- What does the latest research around brain plasticity and neurogenesis tell us about maintaining or even advancing our mental capacities as we age?
- What is the current state of gene research and what does it tell us about ageing (chronological vs. biological age)? How does systemic inflammation tie into that last miserable stretch of our lifespan that we hope to shorten, or ideally, avoid entirely?
- How can advances in AI and Machine Learning help us age better rather than just live longer?
- How do current regulations to the pharmaceutical industry hinder bringing effective anti-ageing drugs to market, and how can we better support ongoing research?
- How does our modern social context contribute to ageing, and what novel concepts are introduced to mitigate negative effects? (loved that part!)
Content Highlights:
- The best part has to be the thoroughly encouraging tone of the book: retired people have a world to offer to their communities, we just need to come up with good concepts to scale it; ageing is not a linear process and a lot of how old age plays out can lie in our hands; retirement doesn't have to be bleak, and there are powerful ways to organise to create the spaces needed for communities to flourish. It's a book that doesn't just lament the problem but suggests actual solutions.
- You truly get a 360 degree perspective on every aspect of Extra Time; we touch on health and lifestyle, economics, politics, society, science and technology. I was amazed at how much oomph can fit into just over 200 pages.
- The author does a great job at looking at successfully and less successfully aging populations around the globe; next to the obvious choices of the US and the UK, we get a glimpse into success concepts around handling the problem of ageing societies in Japan, China, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy and Sub-Saharan Africa. Here something interesting picked up along the way:
"Sub-Saharan Africa finds itself in a demographic bind of a different sort. Its population is expected to quadruple to 4 billion people by 2100, with Nigeria overtaking America as the world’s third most populous country. There is much excitement at the prospect of youth burgeoning as the old world shrinks. Tanzanian President John Magufuli has claimed he sees no need for birth control, insisting a high fertility rate will boost his country’s economy. Sadly, he may be mistaken. The great leaps forward made by the Asian Tiger economies came from the so-called ‘demographic dividend’: of rapid growth in working-age populations, enabling those countries to grow fast and invest, followed by sharp subsequent falls in the birth rate which boosted the skills base, because parents with fewer children could invest more in educating each one."
Key Insights:
- Currently most underrated, one of the most important keys to ageing well are maintaining quality relationships and overall social capital.
- Contrary to popular belief, you are never too old to learn (there are strong learners in every age group) - we now know that there are solid things you can do to maintain your brain plasticity well into old age, chiefly by continuously challenging your brain with activities requiring an intense focus; for example, two areas where there has been robust research are learning a foreign language and playing a musical instrument.
- A higher level of education can help maintain brain plasticity and in turn help starve off degenerative cognitive disease for longer: "This doesn’t mean a professor can’t get Alzheimer’s, but it does suggest that brains which are plastic may be able to re-order themselves to resist its ravages for longer. Studies have suggested that people with higher cognitive reserve may be better at staving off Parkinson’s disease and stroke, as well as dementia."
- The main tenets of ageing well on an individual level are: stay active (notably focusing on the four aspects of fitness: strength, stamina, suppleness and skill), retain your sense of purpose and connect with people, next to nutrition (I quote: "A good basic rule is that what’s good for the heart is generally good for the brain. That means eating oodles of vegetables and fruit, plenty of fibre and avoiding processed foods as much as possible.), limiting stress which includes getting enough sleep, and avoiding excessive pollution, from environmental factors as well as consumption-based ones (e.g. smoking, drinking, etc.).
- Two of the most prominent predictors of old age enjoyed in good health on a population scale are, unfortunately, level of education and (unsurprisingly) income level - if you think about it, it ties into all aspects mentioned above.
- Current retirement ages cannot be sustained: "If current trends continue, some of us living in Europe, parts of Asia and North America could spend a quarter of our lives retired. That is crazy. (...) In 1950, average male life expectancy at 65 was 12 years. By the time we were looking at it, in 2003, it was 20 years. Life expectancy at 65 could be another 35 years by the time we reach mid-century. We should have started increasing the pension age years before.’"Longevity economists Andrew Mason and Ronald Lee have calculated that if people in the ‘older countries’, like Germany, Japan and Spain, were to delay retirement by 2.5 years per decade between 2010 and 2050, that would be sufficient to offset the economic effects of demographic changes.
- The housing crisis and a lack of communities for the elderly are two sides of the same coin; many older people would prefer to move out of their larger homes, however we lack affordable and attractive spaces imbued with a sense of community - "If we could build better housing for older people, we could free up much-needed space for younger ones"
- The dire state of long-term care services (not to be confused with healthcare services), I really had no idea just how bad it was; the book looks at social insurance schemes as pioneered in Germany and Japan.
- Interestingly, your chance of dying stops increasing on a year-by-year basis after age 105 (whether you want to get to that age is an entirely different question...).
The book doesn't fail to pose some tough questions:
Do we truly need anti-ageing research for the well-off, in a world still plagued by TB and malaria?
Do we set the wrong incentives by making access to prescription drugs easier, while keeping steep pay-walls in place for prophylactic maintenance like gyms, physiotherapy, and quality nutrition?
If high earners are set to become much older than the average person, and on top of that receive much higher pension payments for longer, should we introduce corrective measures to ease the tax burden on current generations and maintain a level of fairness compared to blue collar workers?
Great Success Stories mentioned that I don't want to spoiler and cannot paste without making this review even more tediously long:
the Geisinger health centre in Shamokin, Pennsylvania and their Fresh Food Farmacy - Southwark Circle in South London - the Village in Boston - retirement villages in Australia and the US - Germany's multi-generation homes (Mehrgenerationenhäuser) with grandparent service - HomeShare in Australia - Humanitas Deventer in the Netherlands (the latter two are thriving co-housing initiatives between pensioners and students) - Buurtzorg in the Netherlands as an improved concept to conventional care services - the Friendship Benches of Zimbabwe
Favourite Quotes:
What if, instead of defining people by how many birthdays they’ve enjoyed, we define them by how many years they have left? Obviously, that’s hypothetical. None of us can know individually when we will meet our end. But we do know the average. And if we apply that average, things look different. If we defined old age as having 15 years or less left to live, we wouldn’t call many baby boomers ‘old’ until they hit 74. Up to that point they’d be middle-aged.
People who have climbed every ladder life presented, bravely meeting challenges along the way, suddenly find themselves with no more rungs to climb and no compass. What is supposed to be a pleasant time of life can be quietly traumatic. That is why I feel so strongly that older people should not be made to give up work and that we must challenge the narrative of ‘golden’ early retirement.
Extra Time has given us an entirely new stage of life: the stage of the ‘Young-Old’. We need to catch up with this new reality, stop lumping everyone from 60 to 100 together, and accept that it is normal to be vibrant and capable in your seventies.
On the importance of staying active: Lazarus is not just a biking fanatic, he is also emeritus professor at King’s College London, where he has co-authored a study into amateur endurance cyclists like himself. The older cyclists in the study – aged between 55 and 79 – were found to have similar immune systems, strength, muscle mass and cholesterol levels as those who were only in their twenties. The King’s researchers believe that endurance sports, including cycling, swimming and running, may protect the immune system by boosting the number of T-cells in our blood. These protective white blood cells are thought to decline by about 2 per cent a year from our twenties onwards, making us gradually more susceptible to infections and conditions like rheumatoid arthritis. But the older endurance cyclists had almost as many T-cells as 20-year-olds – a protective effect that no medicine yet invented can provide.
and
Stunning results have been seen in an otherwise normal group of American septuagenarians who started running when it became fashionable during the 1970s, and stayed hooked. Over the next 50 years some went on jogging, others took up cycling or swimming or working out, but they did it regularly – and as a hobby, not to compete. To the amazement of the researchers, the muscle strength of these seventy-somethings was almost indistinguishable from 25-year-olds, with as many capillaries and enzymes. Their aerobic capacity was 40 per cent higher than people of their age who were not regular exercisers. The researchers at Ball State University, Indiana, concluded this made both the men and the women biologically 30 years younger than their chronological age.
According to the Harvard Business Review (HBR), older entrepreneurs actually have a much higher success rate than younger ones. The average age of founders of the highest-growth start-ups in the US is now 45, which rises to 47 if you remove social media but keep biotech.
Many ambitious people have their feet clamped so hard on the career accelerator that they have too little time for their families in their thirties, only to get spat out at 60 when they’ve still got plenty of energy and their children don’t need them any more.
When ageing is thought to be immutable, it creates an unusual hurdle for scientists trying to bring anti-ageing drugs to market. Regulators will only license drugs which target defined diseases. Ageing itself is not defined as a disease, because regulators do not think of ageing as something which is treatable, let alone curable. However this makes it difficult to persuade pharmaceutical companies to invest, as they may not get a licence to sell their inventions.
‘We need to shuffle the pack and get younger people into the larger homes, and older people into lovely, purpose-built accommodation without stairs,’ says Lord Richard Best, social housing expert and former chair of Hanover Housing Association. ‘In England, 4.2 million pensioners own properties with two bedrooms they don’t use. If just 2 per cent of them moved out, this could free up 85,000 homes for families who need houses with gardens. Do that every year for ten years and we could house 4 million people!’
(...)legendary work done in one nursing home by the psychologists Ellen Langer and Judith Rodin. The residents were each given a houseplant for their room. Half were told a nurse would look after it, the other half were told they were responsible for it. The improvements in mental and physical wellbeing of the second group were so considerable that, 18 months later, they were only half as likely as the first group to have died.
Taken together, this means that many rich countries are now at a point when ‘an unprecedented claim on economic resources by the oldest generation’ is said to be ‘threatening the social contract between the generations and prospects for continued economic growth’.
Throughout history, transfers have flowed downwards, from old to young. But population ageing has led to a steady decrease in the strength of this downward pattern. In Japan, Germany, Austria, Slovenia and Hungary, rich nations with some of the oldest populations, Lee and Mason find that the direction of transfers has been reversed, probably for the first time in history. This means that current generations are now claiming the resources of future generations. (...)
Many people who have worked hard and paid taxes believe they are entitled to ‘take out’ what they’ve ‘paid in’. Unfortunately, it’s not quite that simple. In pay-as-you-go welfare systems, today’s workers don’t put their taxes into a pot labelled with their name, waiting to be retrieved when they need it. Their taxes are paying the benefits of today’s retirees. UK national insurance contributions and US payroll taxes are invested in government bonds, whose value depends on the ability of future taxpayers to service them. The problem is that baby boomers are set to take out considerably more than they ever paid in, partly by just living longer.
Further reading on the topics of ageing, health span vs. life span and the factors impacting both:
How Not to Age: The Scientific Approach to Getting Healthier as You Get Older
The Village Effect
Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams (I'll never not recommend this one)
Extreme Measures: Finding a Better Path to the End of Life
Aging with Grace: What the Nun Study Teaches Us About Leading Longer, Healthier, and More Meaningful Lives
The Obesity Code: Unlocking the Secrets of Weight Loss
Fiber Fueled: The Plant-Based Gut Health Program for Losing Weight, Restoring Your Health, and Optimizing Your Microbiome
[German] Wechselhafte Jahre - Schriftstellerinnen übers Älterwerden
April 9, 2020
I rather liked this book. I have to admit that I like the author's journalism, which rather gave a head start to the book. I knew that it would be well written and well argued. It was. I knew that it would deal with an important topic in a fairly objective way. It did. I suspected that it would reinforce some of my thinking about an emerging future. I wasn't disappointed there. I found it to be an all round good read.
What is 'Extra Time'? In my work, I am revising the model of long term social futures. We used to think about the post-work period as 'Elderhood'. I am now calling that 'Independent Elderhood' and 'Dependent Elderhood'. This is starting to become a crucial distinction. The Independent Elders aren't 'old' in the sense that we used to view ageing. They have low levels of financial, social, and medical dependence. These are who the author calls the 'Young Old'. We used to think of ageing in terms of dependency, what the author calls 'Old Old'. Extra Time is that which is enjoyed by the 'Young Old' - what we style as Independent Elders.
After defining Extra Time, the book then goes on to consider two aspects of it. First, from an internal perspective, how can an Independent Elder lengthen their Extra Time? Second, what does society need to do to accommodate this Extra Time?
It comes as no surprise that diet and exercise feature as the keys to lengthening Extra Time. Leading a fairly active life and eating a fairly balanced diet are two of the key conclusions. Central to this is staying active, either by continuing to work or by taking on familiar responsibilities, or a combination of both. Many Independent Elders are doing this already. With a mix of part time work to supplement their pensions, combined with an element of day care for grandchildren, many are following this course of action.
The second question is a bit harder to answer. Different societies have adopted different approaches to answer the question. One thing they tend to have in common is the inflexibility of the institutional framework that works against solutions being found. Much revolves around property and the legal infrastructure, entrenched modes of public service delivery, and an unwillingness to give this matter a political priority. Events may overwhelm this. Western governments are putting off the day of reckoning, but the slow rind of demographics will bring things to a head at some point during this decade, as societies hit their moments of 'Peak Boomer'.
Much of the analysis is of little use to much of the world. European, North American, and some East Asian societies are experiencing the impact of ageing. The rest of the world isn't. These are definitely problems of the developed world and we need to be mindful of that focus. Admittedly, in financial terms, these are fairly important issues. However, in terms of headcount, they aren't.
Despite this caveat, I quite liked the book. It is well written and well argued. The pace moves along very well. It is informed and insightful and does take an academic approach to the questions addressed. Even if you disagree with all of the content, the book provides a good example of how to write a knowledgeable piece that is accessible to the general reader. As it happens, I agreed with much of the content, which is why I would recommend the book.
What is 'Extra Time'? In my work, I am revising the model of long term social futures. We used to think about the post-work period as 'Elderhood'. I am now calling that 'Independent Elderhood' and 'Dependent Elderhood'. This is starting to become a crucial distinction. The Independent Elders aren't 'old' in the sense that we used to view ageing. They have low levels of financial, social, and medical dependence. These are who the author calls the 'Young Old'. We used to think of ageing in terms of dependency, what the author calls 'Old Old'. Extra Time is that which is enjoyed by the 'Young Old' - what we style as Independent Elders.
After defining Extra Time, the book then goes on to consider two aspects of it. First, from an internal perspective, how can an Independent Elder lengthen their Extra Time? Second, what does society need to do to accommodate this Extra Time?
It comes as no surprise that diet and exercise feature as the keys to lengthening Extra Time. Leading a fairly active life and eating a fairly balanced diet are two of the key conclusions. Central to this is staying active, either by continuing to work or by taking on familiar responsibilities, or a combination of both. Many Independent Elders are doing this already. With a mix of part time work to supplement their pensions, combined with an element of day care for grandchildren, many are following this course of action.
The second question is a bit harder to answer. Different societies have adopted different approaches to answer the question. One thing they tend to have in common is the inflexibility of the institutional framework that works against solutions being found. Much revolves around property and the legal infrastructure, entrenched modes of public service delivery, and an unwillingness to give this matter a political priority. Events may overwhelm this. Western governments are putting off the day of reckoning, but the slow rind of demographics will bring things to a head at some point during this decade, as societies hit their moments of 'Peak Boomer'.
Much of the analysis is of little use to much of the world. European, North American, and some East Asian societies are experiencing the impact of ageing. The rest of the world isn't. These are definitely problems of the developed world and we need to be mindful of that focus. Admittedly, in financial terms, these are fairly important issues. However, in terms of headcount, they aren't.
Despite this caveat, I quite liked the book. It is well written and well argued. The pace moves along very well. It is informed and insightful and does take an academic approach to the questions addressed. Even if you disagree with all of the content, the book provides a good example of how to write a knowledgeable piece that is accessible to the general reader. As it happens, I agreed with much of the content, which is why I would recommend the book.
July 24, 2023
WOW, I will get this book out and read it again. It's a must for anyone who is ageing, doesn't want to go into a care home, or wants to live lightly on the earth. A well-researched non-fiction fact find about what it means to age in the 21st century.
Camilla is a professional journalist who has worked with the UK government. In this book, she explores ageing and what that actually looks like for the boomer generation and beyond.
She explores ikigai life purpose, retirement age, NHS, and the unfair stealing of pension funds by triple-locked pensioners from future generations.
Again the message is clear. If you want change, you can't expect the government, corporations or pension companies to change; you have to be the agent of your own change.
As you explore what it means to age, what middle age means and what you will do, this book gives you various choices. Depending on your health and life circumstances, some choices won't be as good as others. However, Cavendish (thanks to her position and jobs) gives us a wide range of ways the world deals with the baby boomer demographic.
The stereotype of the lonely, bored pensioner drifting into senility is a myth. How you choose to spend your extra time is up to you before you consider what that might look like-READ THIS BOOK. Well-researched, balanced and full of science and modern humanities, it is illuminating and entertaining. We have choices on how we behave. I've often noted that my dislike of the cruise ship, coffee-drinking early retirees is similar to millennials. This book has shown me why and now I have a blueprint to help them help our planet. It's all about community, which is one of the ways we can live longer and have more fulfilling lives in our old age. This is one of the guidebooks we will need a we navigate the new world created by climate change. This is a must-read for everyone and a GREAT BOOK for anyone who is wrestling with retirement ages. A definite forever book.
Camilla is a professional journalist who has worked with the UK government. In this book, she explores ageing and what that actually looks like for the boomer generation and beyond.
She explores ikigai life purpose, retirement age, NHS, and the unfair stealing of pension funds by triple-locked pensioners from future generations.
Again the message is clear. If you want change, you can't expect the government, corporations or pension companies to change; you have to be the agent of your own change.
As you explore what it means to age, what middle age means and what you will do, this book gives you various choices. Depending on your health and life circumstances, some choices won't be as good as others. However, Cavendish (thanks to her position and jobs) gives us a wide range of ways the world deals with the baby boomer demographic.
The stereotype of the lonely, bored pensioner drifting into senility is a myth. How you choose to spend your extra time is up to you before you consider what that might look like-READ THIS BOOK. Well-researched, balanced and full of science and modern humanities, it is illuminating and entertaining. We have choices on how we behave. I've often noted that my dislike of the cruise ship, coffee-drinking early retirees is similar to millennials. This book has shown me why and now I have a blueprint to help them help our planet. It's all about community, which is one of the ways we can live longer and have more fulfilling lives in our old age. This is one of the guidebooks we will need a we navigate the new world created by climate change. This is a must-read for everyone and a GREAT BOOK for anyone who is wrestling with retirement ages. A definite forever book.
February 8, 2023
Clear and cogent analysis of the challenges and opportunities facing our ageing population—how to keep healthy, avoid the financial black hole that looms due to the demographic bulge, and generally reinvent the last act of life for longer, fulfilling lifespans. The new anti-ageing drugs sound exciting and are almost here. Our gut biomes will soon be fine-tuned for optimal health. And already there are small flickers of inventiveness in countries like Denmark and Holland, vis a vis new styles of accommodation for elderly residents needing care, and new ways of keeping them connected with other generations—critical. We tend to silo the elderly, and that has to stop.
Cavendish is a journalist, of course, and these chapters may have been a series of articles at one point, so deftly do they cover all the bases. I don't see any of this starting to take root in Britain, is all. Which is faintly depressing. Why aren't we better at getting on with things? Anyway, it's a thought-provoking read if you want to engage with changing society to meet the demands of the 'extra time', and there are even ideas for how to volunteer.
Cavendish is a journalist, of course, and these chapters may have been a series of articles at one point, so deftly do they cover all the bases. I don't see any of this starting to take root in Britain, is all. Which is faintly depressing. Why aren't we better at getting on with things? Anyway, it's a thought-provoking read if you want to engage with changing society to meet the demands of the 'extra time', and there are even ideas for how to volunteer.
October 9, 2020
This is excellent, worth more than 5 stars. It is very optimistic and fits my observations. We have the young old, an active bunch, doing a lot for society and their families and you don't really start having problems until you reach roughly 79 and many of these are resolvable but your pace I guess is slower. But you get lumped together as all old. I said to my son, how would you like to be socially grouped with people up to 30 years older than you? But this is the kind of purdah we put people into. She has some innovative other country solutions to our problems of care and isolation that made me think, if only. And I agree about going on working and she knows how difficult jobs are for people of all ages. Some way of promoting part time work for all would be very helpful in this respect. Another, if only. It is very well researched and practical and would be a useful reference for activists.
June 28, 2022
Uma agradável surpresa. Um livro atual que faz um apanhado das questões que nos atormentam e entusiasmam por conseguirmos hoje viver mais anos, sem nos levar ao fatalismo de que estamos todos feitos ao bife.
Não aprofunda muito os temas, mas aborda o essencial, permitindo ter um bocadinho de cada coisa e promovendo uma reflexão sobre o que precisamos de fazer e mudar na nossa sociedade para vivermos mais tempo, saudáveis, livres e felizes.
“Afinal de contas, quem quer lidar com o declínio? Mas os melhores geriatras fazem maravilhas ao administrar esperança, não pessimismo, e ao verem o doente como uma pessoa inteira, não como um joelho ou uma anca problemáticos. Essas são as pessoas de quem precisamos para nos ajudar a mudar os cuidados de saúde com o objetivo de nos mantermos saudáveis, não apenas para tratar a doença.”
Não aprofunda muito os temas, mas aborda o essencial, permitindo ter um bocadinho de cada coisa e promovendo uma reflexão sobre o que precisamos de fazer e mudar na nossa sociedade para vivermos mais tempo, saudáveis, livres e felizes.
“Afinal de contas, quem quer lidar com o declínio? Mas os melhores geriatras fazem maravilhas ao administrar esperança, não pessimismo, e ao verem o doente como uma pessoa inteira, não como um joelho ou uma anca problemáticos. Essas são as pessoas de quem precisamos para nos ajudar a mudar os cuidados de saúde com o objetivo de nos mantermos saudáveis, não apenas para tratar a doença.”
February 25, 2023
This book is based on one side of a difficult topic, ageing. The author takes the view that ageing doesn't matter as much as society believes and that older people remain highly capable, and in some cases more capable that younger people. The pushing of this view gets boring very quickly and the author does not present any counter to this, not showing the obvious decline in ability that comes with age.
The intended audience for this book is clearly older readers, that want comfort, and to be told that age doesn't matter. The book has some good points covered but due to the journalistic writing style nothing actually gets said, just lots of bla bla bla.
Not worth reading.
The intended audience for this book is clearly older readers, that want comfort, and to be told that age doesn't matter. The book has some good points covered but due to the journalistic writing style nothing actually gets said, just lots of bla bla bla.
Not worth reading.
August 24, 2020
Well worth reading. Camilla Cavendish's research helps us understand how one's chronological age does not tell the whole story by any means. Prompts some reflection on what we are headed. i.e. Old age is not getting longer, rather middle age is expanding into a category called the Young-Old. This book dovetails well with The Blue Zones. (highly recommended)
March 31, 2023
Brilliantly written with shocking tough facts! An eye-opener for complacent younger generations, revealing the new retirement era on how to live to our fullest with better health and mind. The authors show us the possibility of a better world with feasible approaches that are already in practice and the ideas should be popularised! The best time to plant a tree is NOW!
February 22, 2020
Informative. A huge amount of research done and presented in an easy-reading way.
We are not only getting older/ living for more years than previously, but we are also having a longer mid-life period - more active and involved in living to the best of our ability.
We are not only getting older/ living for more years than previously, but we are also having a longer mid-life period - more active and involved in living to the best of our ability.
October 15, 2023
Well written nonfiction book that encourages the "young old" population to choose their best life. Choose to be active, choose to have a purpose, choose to be connected, and choose to enjoy life's options.
January 16, 2025
Enjoyed this. Every time I read a chapter I felt grateful I’ve got decades ahead of me. It reminded me it doesn’t need to be grim from 60 onwards. Helps to keep motivated to stay healthy and look after myself in middle age, which should pay dividends in old age
July 30, 2019
Great view on why getting older is no longer relevant to many of us. We keep on going.
November 27, 2019
A book that everyone should read. Luckily it's very well written so a pleasure as well as a necessity. It inspired me to think differently about my ageing and society's.
September 27, 2020
Cogent argument for ikigai: why older folk need a reason to live, and to live comfortably. 2020 may cause a hiccup but the chapter on social care is essential reading.
November 29, 2020
Non-conclusive, it only has some good insights in just two chapters. The author generalizes and concludes based on very superficial examples and small research.
December 17, 2020
Lots of interesting ideas and anecdotes
December 20, 2020
Interesting research about how to slow down the aging process and keep our brains active and healthy. Great conversation starters.
January 14, 2021
An positive uplifting look at ageing in different societies and how to live your extra years to the fullest.
July 27, 2022
A must read.
November 12, 2022
Beautiful writing and interesting perspective of “aging”.
August 22, 2023
Halfway through before book was due for return. Interesting well rounded perspective. Especially like the chapter on brain neurons. Will pick it up again.
January 20, 2024
one of those books that should be required reading. well written and well researched. cannot recommend highly enough.
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