How to mitigate the economic impact of immortality?

How to mitigate the economic impact of immortality?

So, Im writing a story about the modern world after a mysterious event starts giving humans superpowers. While most people can only keep a couple of them at a time, there were a few that everyone over the age of 13 received permanently when all of this started, and one of them was a potent regenerative power that does the following: Halts and reverses aging; nobody with this power ages past their apparent twenties Grants immunity to nearly all diseases Lets people eventually fully recover from anything that doesnt kill them an hour for minor scratches, a day for more severe wounds, a week for lost body parts Retroactively heals all injuries, scars and disabilities you werent born with Now one of the first things that occurred to me about this would be that the economic implications would be insane. Everyone in retirement is suddenly faced with the prospect of long outliving their retirement fund and has to go back to work, flooding the job market with highly qualified and young applicants that actual young people would struggle to compete with. All non-emergency medical care would become unnecessary for all but the youngest generation, crippling the demand. And of course in the long term, several generations of humans with eternal health and youth would cause the death rate to tank and the population to skyrocket over the next few decades. Im sure theres more I missed and please feel free to mention anything that comes to mind if I have, but Im concerned more about if there are any solutions. While I do want to explore the cultural and social implications of what these powers do to the modern world, I dont want it to be excessively dark and brutal, at least not all the time, and not at first. So Im hoping to find some way these darker side-effects could be mitigated, or how this could possibly be turned to the advantage of the economy. What could a country do to keep the effects of this newfound immortality from devastating the economy, or possibly turn it to its advantage

What negative economic effects You have just opened the entire solar system for us to plunder The biggest thing keeping us from mining the asteroid belts and outer planets is the negative effects of hard radiation and weightlessness. With enhanced human healing to negate those issues... The stars are ours

You talk of retirement funds. People retire at an age when it is significantly harder for them to continue working, and the retirement fund is meant to provide for the years when they would need more health services etc. With this new immortality, people would be able to continue working indefinitely. No need to retire. Since the older generations would be able to work, and neednt worry about health expenses, they would be able to financially assist their children and grandchildren, allowing them to get higher education, start looking for jobs when they are better qualified. Youd have a richer population same working older people, who have amassed funds, so youd be able to sell them stuff. Thats conductive for new enterprises to grow. Some branches of the market would suffer production of coffins, for instance, but more would grow. For instance, youd need more housing, since thered be more people. Housing provides jobs to many people: architects, interior designers, construction workers, furniture designers and makers, etc. More jobs, more services provided, would mean that all those young able-bodied people would have no shortage of jobs. Financially, your world should flourish. There is, however, a serious caveat: how are you going to feed all those people Earths resources are finite. If you dont have enough food for everyone, food prices would skyrocket, so would crime rates by desperate hungry people, economy would be strained by the inability to have everyones basic needs met.

Piggybacking off of Galastels answer, in a society of immortals one might find the traditional retirement replaced by sabbaticals. These could come about simply as a spontaneous cultural change, or as the result of legislation by the government, depending on the politics of your world. Either way, a person works 30 or 40 years in a given profession, all the while saving up a large amount of money in an investment account. At that point heshe resigns and takes, say, 10-15 years off work to travel, spend time with family friends, or perhaps start pursuing education to move onto a whole new career track. Upon finishing that education heshe becomes a fresh out with no more experience or advantage other than general life lessons over hisher counterpart who is 30-40 years younger. Or 70-80 years younger, or 100-110 years younger... I mean hey, why not try out a whole range of careers if you have all the time in the world to do so It worked for Lazarus Long : In a society of immortals, boredom is IMO the chief concern of the prolonged lives. Hence youd find a strong demand for entertainment options. The arts in all aspects could and would benefit: theater, TVmovies, literature, etc. The older wealthier a given individual becomes, the more likely heshe may be to scout out promising young artists, actors, writers etc. to sponsor financially. Food supply, as you mentioned, would be a pinch point. I would imagine this world, if the people have the sense the resources, would start RD for space colonization piggybacking off Henry Taylors answer now. Thats another opportunity for new jobs, needing talented engineers, researchers, etc. Colonies may be habitable planets in other solar systems, or self-supporting space stations, or both. All these of course are quite optimistic results. On the darker side perhaps tying in with that entertainment industry boom, you might start seeing, say, gladiatorial competitions -- happily enabled by the fact that the fighters can cut each other to ribbons and then be healed up and back at it in a month or so. Varleys Steel Beach, I believe, envisioned such -- although in that case it was just a highly advanced medical science that enabled it. But one way or another, I think there are plenty of possibilities for the economy to absorb and adapt to these new circumstances.