Distributional Aspects of Time to Death in Human Populations

Timothy L. M. Riffe, University of California, Berkeley
Adam Lenart, Max Planck Odense Center and University of Southern Denmark

All lifetable summary indices are functions of age, but these are usually only calculated for age zero, or sometimes the age at maturity, retirement or some other particular age. We propose to let lifetable summary measures be calculated at any age. In this manuscript, we provide some elementary definitions of functions describing the conditional lifespan distribution, and apply these to human populations. We suggest a selection of applications for late life decisions, such as the decision to bequest or move into a care residence, based on these distributional measures.