The Longevity Economy
Unlocking the World's Fastest-Growing, Most Misunderstood Market
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Oldness: a social construct at odds with reality that constrains how we live after middle age—and stifles business thinking on how to best serve a group of consumers, workers, and innovators that is growing larger and wealthier with every passing day.
Over the past two decades, Joseph F. Coughlin has been busting myths about aging with groundbreaking multidisciplinary research into what older people actually want—not what conventional wisdom suggests they need. In The Longevity Economy, Dr. Coughlin provides the framing and insight business leaders need to serve the growing older market: a vast, diverse group of consumers representing every possible level of health and wealth, worth about $8 trillion in the United States alone and climbing.
Dr. Coughlin provides deep insight into a population that consistently defies expectations: people who, through their continued personal and professional ambition, desire for experience, and quest for self-actualization, are building a striking, unheralded vision of longer life that very few in business fully understand. His focus on women—they outnumber men, control household spending and finances, and are leading the charge toward tomorrow's creative new narrative of later life—is especially illuminating.
Dr. Coughlin pinpoints the gap between myth and reality and then shows businesses how to bridge it. As the demographics of global aging transform and accelerate, it is now critical to build a new understanding of the shifting physiological, cognitive, social, family, and psychological realities of the longevity economy.
Reviews
-Atul Gawande, Author of Being Mortal“I loved this book. It's thought-provoking, insightful, and unexpectedly fun. You'll learn about what we get wrong about a world where people live a long time, how innovators botch serving such people, and how everyone from families to companies can do a lot better. ”
-Jo Ann Jenkins, CEO, AARPJoe Coughlin has proven that the time has come to create a new narrative of possibility in old age.
-Dan Buettner, National Geographic Fellow and author of The Blue ZonesJoe Coughlin's The Longevity Economy is a can't-miss business book. He has done a terrific job exploding “old age" as a concept. The magnificent result―at once forward-looking, hilariously irreverent, and engaging―serves as an indispensable road map for how to take full advantage of life's ever-lengthening third act.
-Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., President and CEO, TIAAIn The Longevity Economy, Joe Coughlin offers keen insights into the aging population and how it is transforming our society and economy. Longer lifespans will revolutionize the way we live and offer incredible new opportunities, but will also require a new rigor in the way people plan and save for their later years.
-Stephanie Linnartz, Marriott International Global Chief Commercial OfficerThis book is classic Coughlin, complete with real-life examples too big to ignore and too interesting to forget.
-Andy Sieg, Head of Merrill Lynch Wealth ManagementForget what you ‘think' you know about aging. The landscape of later life has been transformed, and thanks to Joe Coughlin we now have a GPS to guide us through this exciting new world.
About the Author
Joseph F. Coughlin, PhD is Director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology AgeLab. He teaches in MIT's Department of Urban Studies & Planning and the Sloan School's Advanced Management Program. Coughlin conducts research on the impact of global demographic change and technology trends on consumer behavior and business strategy. He advises a wide variety of global firms in financial services, healthcare, leisure and travel, luxury goods, real estate, retail, technology, and transportation.
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