Death and pensions
Where once human beings invested in the afterlife, they now invest in pensions.
Archaeologist Tim Taylor has been tracing how humans invented the soul and how, with the idea of the soul, came worries about what happens to the soul when the body dies. He explains to Laurie Taylor all the myriad ways across time and cultures that we’ve sought to safeguard ourselves against the dead and their central role in the development of civilisation itself. Kate Berridge, an expert on our modern way of death, discusses how natural death has been sidelined in Western Culture and now all our invention goes towards prolonging life itself.
This week a research institute suggested that one solution to the current pensions crisis would be to put back the age of retirement: we can work longer, save more, retire later. Laurie Taylor talks to Robin Blackburn, author of a new study of the history and future of pension schemes, about the sociological hurdles to be overcome before this idea can work and hears how a Swedish experiment from the 1970s may hold the key to equitable pensions for all.
Additional information
Robin Blackburn
Verso
ISBN: 1 85984 795 1
Pension Policy Institute report:
Timothy Taylor
The Buried Soul
ISBN 1857026969
Kate Berridge
Vigor Mortis
ISBN 1861974116
Kate Berridge talks about Vigor Mortis recently on Woman's Hour
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