Nobody wants to die — but what if you could pay the piper with cash, instead of your mortal soul?
People have always been willing to spend money to try to pay off the Grim Reaper. But modern would-be immortals know that old-fashioned cure-alls, like the ground mummy dust to which hopeful aristocrats turned in medieval times, were only so much quackery. And modern medicine has done a great job of extending our lives already. In the past 100 years, the human life span has increased 65 percent, to 78 years.
But those who want to cheat the fates still have some extreme options open to them. Life-extension guru Ray Wolford, whose belief that calorie restriction could keep him alive longer, embraced a minimalist diet that caused his weight to plummet to a mere 130 pounds. (He succumbed to Lou Gehrig's disease at age 71.)
Science has also been on the trail of myriad age-defying drugs. Some, like one that was reportedly being developed by Pfizer, have flamed out. But tiny firms like Elixir Pharmaceuticals are still chasing that dream.
Wealth and high status may even themselves confer a longer life span. Reams of data indicate that they might stave off death; hundreds of papers have been published on the problem.
Money envy
Part of the benefit, everyone agrees, is that there are huge benefits to not being dirt-poor: clean drinking water, good medical care and safe housing, to name a few. And taking care of those basic needs causes a steep rise in life expectancy. No one denies it's better to live in a penthouse in New York, treated by a Park Avenue doctor, than in a slum in an impoverished Third World country. Another explanation is that healthier people simply make more money.
But one vocal group of researchers says the problem has nothing to do with material comfort at all. Instead, it is the mental stress of being less wealthy than our peers that kills us.
Part of the evidence for that theory comes from the Whitehall study, a giant 20-year study of British civil servants conducted by Sir Michael Marmot of University College, London.
All of the people in the Whitehall study had access to universal medical care, and none were impoverished. Still, there was a substantial difference between the life spans of junior and senior civil servants. Those who made more money, or who had attained higher rank, lived substantially longer. Mid-level administrators did better than porters — even after risky behaviors like smoking and drinking were accounted for.
Keeping up with the Joneses
Richard Wilkinson of Nottingham University argues that the really important difference is not how much money you make but how your bank account compares with your neighbor's. Some U.S. states, he says, are twice as rich as others, but they don't have better health.
George Kaplan, an epidemiologist at the University of Michigan, says Wilkinson's psychological status argument "is to my mind completely discredited." He points out that the benefits of having money can be much greater than simply having better health care or food. True, after taking a jet plane across the Atlantic, a businessman who flew in first class feels better than one who flew in coach. But that's because he got plenty of leg room, a good meal, free drinks and plenty of sleep. You can explain the better health of the guy in first class without resorting to his psychological superiority to the schlubs in coach.
Either way, it's nice to be the guy with the cash.