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marginalia_nutoday at 5:02 PM2 repliesview on HN

How are we sure about the direction of cause and effect here? I'd expect more healthier people to self-select the working cohort, all else being equal.


Replies

asdfftoday at 6:19 PM

In practice it doesn't really work that way. It isn't like "I am ill bodied, I ought to retire." It is more like "I am ill bodied, but I can't afford to retire, so I must work in some capacity." People who retire early are probably far more likely to be wealthier, and that is correlated with healthspan.

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amanaplanacanaltoday at 5:24 PM

Yeah this seems like an obvious confounder.