The Linear Rise in the Number of Our Days

Jim Oeppen,James W Vaupel

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-05075-7_13

Abstract

If life expectancy – also known as the expectation of life, is the mean life-span of a cohort of newborns if current age-specific death rates remain unchanged – in developed countries were close to an ultimate limit, then increases in record life expectancy – the average length of life in the best-practice population – should slow as the ceiling is asymptotically approached.

Highlights

If life expectancy1 – known as the expectation of life, is the mean life-span of a cohort of newborns if current age-specific death rates remain unchanged – in developed countries were close to an ultimate limit, increases in record life expectancy – the average length of life in the best-practice population – should slow as the ceiling is asymptotically approached
We are grateful to the many people who have provided comments and information, including Kenneth Wachter and Yasuhik Saito
A version of this article that does not include some of the material here but that includes some additional material was published by Oeppen and Vaupel in 2002

Summary

Introduction

If life expectancy1 – known as the expectation of life, is the mean life-span of a cohort of newborns if current age-specific death rates remain unchanged – in developed countries were close to an ultimate limit, increases in record life expectancy – the average length of life in the best-practice population – should slow as the ceiling is asymptotically approached. Officials charged with forecasting trends in life expectancy over future decades should base their calculations on the empirical record of mortality improvements over a corresponding or even longer span of the past4 (Lee and Carter 1992; Alho 1998; Tuljapurkar et al 2000; Wilmoth 1998; Olshansky et al 2001; Lee 2001).

Results

Conclusion