The increase in share of survival gains realized late in life has important economic and
social consequences. Demographers, actuaries, and others have long realized that gains
in longevity are distributed across the lifespan, and that the distribution of gains in
survival has important implications for the balance of production and consumption, as
well as for the finances of transfer programs like social security (Lee and Tuljapurkar
1997). However, the broad implications of this longevity transition have not generally
been well recognized beyond a coterie of specialists in the field. That the Jackson Hole
Symposium includes a panel on demographics demonstrates foresight regarding the
importance of these trends