The Richer You Are, The Older You Will Be

 If you are rich, do you live longer?

Now, here is how I look at this info; other than possible access to a better doctor, what is it the rich have that poorer folks don’t have?Money?But wait, money isn’t the answer; the answer is less worry and less stress. You have less stress if you have enough money every month to live as you wish. What do we provide that can provide income?Income riders. If Income Riders can provide income that cannot be outlived, then stress would be less right?So the real analysis would be changed to this, if you have an income rider, you will live longer, make sense?A terrific article in the Wall Street Journal based on research by economist Barry Bosworth at the Brookings Institution crunched the numbers and found that the richer you are, the longer you’ll live. And it’s a gap that is widening, particularly among women.http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2014/04/18/the-richer-you-are-the-older-youll-get/  Mr. Bosworth worked with data from the University of Michigan’s Health and Retirement Study, a survey that tracks the health and work-life of 26,000 Americans as they age and retire. The data is especially valuable as it tracks the same individuals every two years in what’s known as a longitudinal study to see how their lives unfold.The good news is that men of all incomes are living longer. Yet the data shows that the life expectancy of the wealthy is growing much faster than the life expectancy of the poor.I still stand by my philosophy that stress is the major cause of not living longer, and knowing you have income that can never be outlived can reduce stress.