[nemo44x]

What about people that make healthy choices and live long enough to bear cancer a few times, shake off a few other diseases, have hips replaced, collect endless Medicare and SS payments, etc?

The person who blows their heart out at 53 probably costs a whole lot less VS what they put into society.

[jdiff]

Sure, your weird struck-by-lightning-57-times strawman might cost more than your average suicide-by-mcdonalds person. But healthy people are more productive and are productive for longer and only a vanishingly small portion of them are ever going to get struck by lightning once, let alone 57 times.

[brightlancer]

> But healthy people are more productive and are productive for longer

Not nearly as long as they live, sucking up healthcare resources.

"Unhealthy" people like smokers and the obese are more cost-effective, because they're nearly as productive per year and they die before needing the absurdly expensive medical care for old age.

https://web.archive.org/web/20230728192509/https://www.nytim...

[nemo44x]

People use the vast majority of their lives medical expenditure in their last year or so of life if they make it to old age. Someone dying in their 50s before they hit the ground coats very little. Saying that I hope everyone lives long healthy lives.

[jdiff]

They're not vanishing silently and peacefully into the night, they're killing themselves with chronic poor health. That's the entire problem, they're not dodging it, they're embracing, amplifying, and accelerating it.