Average life expectancy has gradually increased in Spain until reaching 82.3 years, that is, the age at which it is estimated that those born in 2021 will reach. Although there are important differences that exceed 6 years depending on the level of income and whether they have university education or not, this fact raises the debate of delaying the retirement age.
In France, for example, where life expectancy is 82 years, Emmanuel Macron decided last spring to postpone retirement from 62 to 64, which caused tremendous public unrest. In Spain, the current retirement age is 66 years and 4 months - or 65 when 37 years and nine months have been paid. From 2027 it will increase to 67 years, and to retire at 65 you will need to have contributed even longer, 38 years and six months. The Cercle d'Empresaris has already put on the table the possibility of postponing it until the age of 68 and, if possible, until the age of 72.
Not being able to retire until such late ages is making rivers of ink run. In April, for example, The New York Times published an article in which it introduced an interesting variable: "life expectancy" is not the same as "health expectancy", meaning age from which people, also on average, begin to suffer physical and mental problems.
According to the INE, the number of years in good health in Spain in 2020 (the latest date for which information is available) was the same for women as for men: 66.3 years. That is to say, above the EU average: this figure is 64.5 years for European women and 63.5 years for Europeans.
Having more or less hope for health depends on the type of job, the lifestyle, the level of income or having a university education, as this affects, for example, the attitude towards health: with better education, patients, in addition to getting sick less (thanks to preventing this possibility), have better adherence to treatments.
For all these reasons, there are people who begin to decline at a very early age (there are chronic diseases from childhood) and there are others who at 75 are in perfect condition, even if they are the exception, since it must be emphasized that the average health expectancy, taking into account all ages, in Spain is 66.3 years. This means that the majority of those who will retire in Spain during 2023 at 66.4 years old will have already begun their physical and mental decline at 66.3 years old, according to the INE.
If some age groups are considered, those who arrive in good health at the age of 50 (a minority) can expect – according to the INE – to be disease-free for another 21.4 years. On the other hand, those who arrive in perfect condition at the age of 65 (an even smaller population group), tend to be in good physical and mental health, in statistical terms, up to the age of 76.5 in the case of women and up to at 76.6 years for men. From these ages until death, it is normal for physical and mental decline to intensify, as it is the law of life.
In the event that retirement was at the age of 68 (and let's not talk about it if it were at 72), the situation would be much worse. At best, if the person in question were lucky enough to reach half a century of life in good health (which, statistically speaking, is not the most common occurrence) they could only enjoy about three and a half years free of physical or mental limitations, since at 71.4 years the descent begins for men and at 71.6 for women in the age group of the most fortunate.
Based on this evidence, the path forks in two directions. There are those who propose to delay the retirement age using two arguments. The first is economic: strengthening the public pension system. The second is health: delaying retirement is associated with a lower risk of death. Various researches point out, for example, that the decline in physical activity and the lower number of social interactions that comes with leaving the working life are largely responsible for the post-retirement decline.
However, these investigations do not tell the whole truth. While some people stay fit by working very late in knowledge-related areas (the basic example is teachers), other more physically demanding or precarious jobs take their toll on health much sooner.
There are manual jobs (such as, for example, agriculture or any occupation with a marked physical component), which towards the age of sixty can no longer be carried out with the same energy due to the muscle and bone disorders caused by making movements repeated over many years, bending the torso or handling heavy loads. In this type of occupation, retiring as soon as possible can ostensibly improve health.
"If you leave a job that harms you physically, in which you sleep terribly and are constantly stressed, retirement is great for your health," admitted Lisa Renzi-Hammond, director of the Institute of Gerontology at the New York Times University of Georgia (USA).
In relation to statistics, an old joke explains that if one person eats two chickens and another eats one, the statistics will consider that, on average, each person has eaten one chicken. Without reaching these extremes, the statistics on life expectancy also abuse the big spout. According to Alejo Rodríguez-Fraticelli, doctor at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine in Barcelona (IRB) "when we talk about life expectancy we are referring to statistical averages, but we do not consider distributions".
"The reality - continues this ICREA professor - is that we are not a number: life expectancy is an average that says that, from an average age, half of the people will continue to live, while the other half he will have died earlier”.
"The majority of the population begins to have health problems from the age of sixty or seventy, depending on their habits, access to the health system, the type of education they have received, etc.," explains this specialist in antiaging blood, one of the most promising lines of research currently available to slow the aging of metabolism.
"But within any average there is a lot of heterogeneity. For example, in the neighborhood where I lived in Boston (USA) there was a life expectancy of 90 years, but just by crossing three streets it was reduced to 66 years, similar to that in Kenya", says this cell biologist, recalling the time that happened at Boston Children's Hospital. "Although setting a retirement age that is the same for everyone seems to get people to settle, the ideal would be to spin thinner," he suggests.
Ultimately, it would be about making the retirement date as fair as possible and not only depending on the life expectancy of the population in general, but of each person in particular. "It may be that this is the horizon we have in front of us and one of the challenges to which we must respond", points out this scientist.
Finally, there is another topic that is not talked about enough: after working for 37 or 38 years... what do we deserve? Work for a few more years or retire early and enjoy wonderful years in good health? In Spain, France, Italy and other places, the vast majority continue to choose this option.
