The Longevity Economy: Unlocking the World's Fastest-Growing, Most Misunderstood Market

by Joseph F. Coughlin

Overview

Oldness: a social construct at odds with reality that constrains how we live after middle age and stifles business thinking on how to best serve a group of consumers, workers, and innovators that is growing larger and wealthier with every passing day.

Over the past two decades, Joseph F. Coughlin has been busting myths about aging with groundbreaking multidisciplinary research into what older people actually want — not what conventional wisdom suggests they need. In The Longevity Economy, Coughlin provides the framing and insight business leaders need to serve the growing older market: a vast, diverse group of consumers representing every possible level of health and wealth, worth about $8 trillion in the United States alone and climbing.

Coughlin provides deep insight into a population that consistently defies expectations: people who, through their continued personal and professional ambition, desire for experience, and quest for self-actualization, are building a striking, unheralded vision of longer life that very few in business fully understand. His focus on women — they outnumber men, control household spending and finances, and are leading the charge toward tomorrow's creative new narrative of later life — is especially illuminating.

Coughlin pinpoints the gap between myth and reality and then shows businesses how to bridge it. As the demographics of global aging transform and accelerate, it is now critical to build a new understanding of the shifting physiological, cognitive, social, family, and psychological realities of the longevity economy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781610396639
Publisher:	PublicAffairs
Publication date:	11/07/2017
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	160,110
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Joseph Coughlin is the founder and director of the MIT AgeLab, a multidisciplinary research program created to understand the behavior of the 50+ population, the role of technology in their lives, and the opportunity for innovation to improve the quality of life for older adults and their families. He is a member of the board of directors of AARP, AARP Services, and Benchmark Senior Living. Coughlin consults with major companies in the United States and internationally, including BMW, Colgate, Kimberly Clark, JP Morgan, Marriott, Johnson & Johnson, Cartier, and many others.

Editorial Reviews

08/28/2017
Would-be entrepreneurs take note: the founding director of MIT’s AgeLab has a message for you about a severely underestimated, undertapped market. By 2050, people over 65 will be more than 16.7% of the world’s population—and more than 25% of the populations of some European and Asian countries. Yet “less than 15 percent of companies have established any sort of strategies focused on older adults.” Meanwhile, older women in particular are projected by economists to have a huge influence on the marketplace. Coughlin goes on to show in detail why Silicon Valley and other tech hubs are, in their bias toward the young and male as both workers and consumers, missing a huge opportunity. Coughlin even argues that, if American businesses could find ways to capture the productivity of an older workforce, they could improve America’s GDP. The author’s evangelism is contagious. Convinced that home sharing, grocery delivery, and online dating sites are examples of services that transcend age in their appeal, he makes a striking case for putting a new, less generically young and male face on entrepreneurship, product design, and marketing. His book should inspire entrepreneurs of all generations to dust off their best business plans and make products that are exciting for all ages and abilities. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

"I loved this book. It's thought-provoking, insightful, and unexpectedly fun. You'll learn about what we get wrong about a world where people live a long time, how innovators botch serving such people, and how everyone from families to companies can do a lot better. With fantastic stories of runaway successes and hilarious flops alike ("Senior Food," anyone?), Coughlin demonstrates how design and innovation can change the way we age."
—Atul Gawande, author of Being Mortal

"Forget what you 'think' you know about aging. The landscape of later life has been transformed, and thanks to Joe Coughlin we now have a GPS to guide us through this exciting new world."—Andy Sieg, head of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management

"Joe Coughlin has proven that the time has come to create a new narrative of possibility in old age. In The Longevity Economy, he not only defines that better narrative—he shows businesses how to lead in creating it and how to profit from the opportunities it provides."—Jo Ann Jenkins, CEO, AARP

"Joe Coughlin has done a terrific job exploding "old age" as a concept. The magnificent result—at once forward-looking, hilariously irreverent, and engaging—serves as an indispensable road map for how to take full advantage of life's ever-lengthening third act. As I've found among the world's longest-lived people, celebrating older people is a key ingredient. The Longevity Economy shows us how to harness the skills of the wisest people among us and help them—and everyone around them—live longer."—Dan Buettner, National Geographic Fellow and author of The Blue Zones

"In The Longevity Economy, Joe Coughlin offers keen insights into the aging population and how it is transforming our society and economy. Longer lifespans will revolutionize the way we live and offer incredible new opportunities, but will also require a new rigor in the way people plan and save for their later years. Coughlin's work is helping raise awareness of the demographic shifts, helping build critical understanding of the need for individuals, businesses and policymakers alike to adapt and change for the future."—Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., President and CEO, TIAA

"This book is classic Coughlin, complete with real-life examples too big to ignore and too interesting to forget. The Longevity Economy doesn't just make you rethink the role of consumer insights and trends, it forces you to re-imagine their impact."
—Stephanie Linnartz, Marriott International Global Chief Commercial Officer

"What a magnificent book! Dr. Coughlin dispels the many biases that surround our perceptions of aging as a path to irrelevance. It should instead be seen as a path to ascendance. Increasingly, inclusive design is where businesses are heading because 'the golden years' are where true gold lies in the new, longevity economy."—John Maeda, author of The Laws ofSimplicity and Redesigning Leadership

From the Publisher

2017-09-04
Demographics and economics meet in this oddly cheering book about the world's aging population.Geezers of the world, unite; you're a member of the baby boom, you're about to reassert your role as a huge market force. By 2030, writes MIT AgeLab founder and director Coughlin, there will be 1 billion people worldwide who are 65 or older, a number that will rise to 1.6 billion by 2050. "The emerging population of older adults isn't just big," he writes. "It's so enormous, it's as though a new continent were rising out of the sea, filled with more than a billion air-breathing consumers just begging for products that fulfill their demands." In the U.S., senior spending and what economists call its downstream effects amounted to about $8 trillion in 2015, $10,000 more per capita in spending than those aged 30 to 44. Advertisers will obviously want to rethink their efforts to capture the younger demographic stratum when so much money is waiting to be claimed at the upper end. Coughlin examines some of the changes that are being wrought in recognition of older consumers, and he identifies a few design challenges to come. For instance, he observes, CVS drugstores began to organize stock to lessen "store-wandering from folks dealing with mobility impairments" by, for example, grouping diabetes-related products together. Inspired by the tennis balls that some seniors put on their walker feet so that they slide more easily, some manufacturers have added plastic skis. Business opportunities ranging from grocery delivery to home care and landscaping are broadening with this rising audience. The author urges younger readers to prepare for impending old age by saving far more than they do (only about 4 in 10 millennials, he writes, save consistently at all), and he concludes that those who have prepared will find that "we are on the cusp of learning to celebrate life in old age—while we're still alive." Fruitful reading for trend-spotters and entrepreneurs, who will find much grist for their mills.

Kirkus Reviews

The world is getting older, and MIT Age Lab founder Joseph F. Coughlin wants to contribute to a new narrative on how to live. In an upbeat narration, Kiff VandenHeuvel voices the the author’s case that age isn't a problem. VandenHeuvel adds urgency and excitement to Coughlin's consideration of quality-of-life issues such as socializing and achievement and raises his voice to show the author’s indignation with investors who don't consider older entrepreneurs and markets. Coughlin sees both good and bad in retirement communities that fill seniors' days with activity but are split off from the general population and are not contributing tax revenues for schools. He also investigates the changing lives of older women. Listeners will find themselves pondering the issues Coughlin raises. J.A.S. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2018 - AudioFile

The world is getting older, and MIT Age Lab founder Joseph F. Coughlin wants to contribute to a new narrative on how to live. In an upbeat narration, Kiff VandenHeuvel voices the the author’s case that age isn't a problem. VandenHeuvel adds urgency and excitement to Coughlin's consideration of quality-of-life issues such as socializing and achievement and raises his voice to show the author’s indignation with investors who don't consider older entrepreneurs and markets. Coughlin sees both good and bad in retirement communities that fill seniors' days with activity but are split off from the general population and are not contributing tax revenues for schools. He also investigates the changing lives of older women. Listeners will find themselves pondering the issues Coughlin raises. J.A.S. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2018 - AudioFile