From: Billy Brown (bbrown@conemsco.com)
Date: Wed Apr 21 1999 - 12:01:05 MDT
Robin Hanson wrote:
> Happy to comment, but I'm not sure what the question is here exactly..
> (I said a lot at http://www.transhumanist.com/volume2/singularity.htm)
I think the question is, given:
1) A future in which lifespans become very long (>200 years).
2) At least reasonably good (by current standards) economic conditions.
3) A population in which a majority of people over age 50 wish to retire.
Is there anything we can say about the likelihood of their being able to do
so? We can readily see that compound interest will allow individuals to
amass substantial sums of money over the course of several decades, so with
decent interest rates the answer would seem to be yes. However, it was
suggested that such a large pool of savings might cause interest rates to
collapse, due to a relative shortage of profitable investment opportunities.
That doesn't appear to be likely in a fast-growth economy, but what about
other likely scenarios? For that matter, what are the more likely
scenarios?
Billy Brown, MCSE+I
bbrown@conemsco.com
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