Well, as Harvey observes in the comments to my March on Washington post, it looks like my suggestion that we raise the retirement age has not been greeted with too much enthusiasm. I can’t blame people for not being excited about the idea of a delayed retirement. However, I did think people would have more enthusiasm for the idea of healthy life extension.

I guess, as a marketing guy, I should have known that “let’s raise the retirement age” is not the most appealing way to package longevity research.

I should take a lesson from J. Storrs Hall who tells us that we should stop talking about “the singularity” and start talking about “early retirement” for humanity. He makes a good case — we are potentially just a few generations of technology away from human labor being rendered obsolete. I’ve suggested that one possibility, in a world where the machines do all the productive labor, would be for human beings to all have BS jobs. Josh notes that there are other, perhaps more well-thought-out ideas about how we will handle wealth distribution in a roboconomy.

Anyhow, “early retirement” sounds like something we could all go for — a chance to get out of the rat race and pursue our dreams. Will people stop working? Of course not. People will work at things they care about, irrespective of economic need.

I have to admit, that sounds a lot better than delayed retirement. Here we have a future we might get people marching towards. What say you, Harvey?