I also suspect the current record holder for oldest person Jeanne Calment was a fraud. She beat the number two by 3 years (122 versus 119), the record was set back in 1996 but no one came close. But most importantly she had a reason to dupe people, because she sold her house at an old age.
> In 1965, aged 90 and with no heirs left, Calment signed a life estate contract on her apartment with civil law notary André-François Raffray, selling the property in exchange for a right of occupancy and a monthly revenue of 2,500 francs (€380) until her death. Raffray died on 25 December 1995, by which time Calment had received more than double the apartment's value from him, and his family had to continue making payments.
> the death of Kato prompted a nationwide investigation, which concluded that police did not know if 234,354 people older than 100 were still alive.[13] More than 77,000 of these people, officials said, would have been older than 120 years old if they were still alive. Poor record keeping was blamed for many of the cases
All those claims that Japan has the world’s longest living population...
Government pension is such a scam. When someone dies, the remaining pension up to age 100 should be transferred as a lump sump to their estate. Or perhaps the lesser of that, and the amount they paid into the ponzi scheme throughout their working years, adjusted for interest.
It's not a scam. It's the difference between annuities (longevity insurance) and savings.
If you wanted all pensions to provide a death benefit in addition to the annuity you'd need to either significantly reduce payouts to the living or significantly higher payments into the pension fund.
I also suspect the current record holder for oldest person Jeanne Calment was a fraud. She beat the number two by 3 years (122 versus 119), the record was set back in 1996 but no one came close. But most importantly she had a reason to dupe people, because she sold her house at an old age.
> In 1965, aged 90 and with no heirs left, Calment signed a life estate contract on her apartment with civil law notary André-François Raffray, selling the property in exchange for a right of occupancy and a monthly revenue of 2,500 francs (€380) until her death. Raffray died on 25 December 1995, by which time Calment had received more than double the apartment's value from him, and his family had to continue making payments.
More in the Guardian review of Morbid by Saul Justin Newman
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/jun/17/morbid-by-saul...
> the death of Kato prompted a nationwide investigation, which concluded that police did not know if 234,354 people older than 100 were still alive.[13] More than 77,000 of these people, officials said, would have been older than 120 years old if they were still alive. Poor record keeping was blamed for many of the cases
All those claims that Japan has the world’s longest living population...
Sounds like "Respect for the Aged Day" doubles as "Audit the Pensioners Day".
Government pension is such a scam. When someone dies, the remaining pension up to age 100 should be transferred as a lump sump to their estate. Or perhaps the lesser of that, and the amount they paid into the ponzi scheme throughout their working years, adjusted for interest.
It's not a scam. It's the difference between annuities (longevity insurance) and savings.
If you wanted all pensions to provide a death benefit in addition to the annuity you'd need to either significantly reduce payouts to the living or significantly higher payments into the pension fund.