The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity: Summary & Key Insights

Across the twenty-first century, human lifespan has been rising at an unprecedented pace. A century ago, living to seventy was exceptional; now, reaching eighty or ninety has become ordinary. Studies suggest that half of all children born today may live beyond a hundred. This is no science-fiction fantasy but the direct result of advances in healthcare, improved living standards, and social transformation. Ours is an age that demands we ask: is your life designed for that long journey?

Longevity doesn’t just mean more years—it means redefining the shape of life itself. A century-long life brings extended careers, evolving family patterns, and ever-changing personal identities. We are leaving behind the linear model of childhood, adulthood, and old age and moving into a world of multiple beginnings and recurring reinventions. The freedom to choose comes with the responsibility to keep learning, adapting, and staying open to change.

The industrialized twentieth century gave us a clear three-stage script: first, full-time study; then, a lifetime of work; finally, retirement. This formula worked when lifespans were shorter and economies were stable. Now, with thirty more years added, it breaks down. Education in youth can no longer sustain a six- or seven-decade career. Traditional pensions can’t support what might become a forty-year retirement. Even more, the linear identity—student, worker, retiree—no longer fits the complexity of modern aspirations.

One interviewee in our research, age fifty, once told us: ‘I’ve completed all three stages, yet I feel as curious and energetic as ever.’ That moment crystallized for us the need for a new life framework—not a repetition of past routines, but a constant reassembly of self, creating new chapters along the way.