Finance
Life spans are growing but ‘health spans’ are shrinking
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First, the good news: Americans are living longer than they used to.
Now, the bad news: Older Americans are spending more years in poor health. That dynamic often comes with negative financial consequences, medical and financial experts say.
Since 1960, the average U.S. life span has increased to 77.5 from roughly 70 years old, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But “health spans” are simultaneously shrinking.
A health span is the number of years older people spend in fundamentally good health, said Susan Roberts, a professor of medicine and epidemiology and senior associate dean for foundational research at Dartmouth College.
Today, the average person spends about 10 years with chronic ailments like diabetes, cancer, arthritis, cardiovascular disease, dementia, cataracts or osteoporosis — roughly double the duration in the 1960s, Roberts said.
As a result, there’s a “widening gap” between one’s life and health spans, she said.
This is because medicine has gotten better at keeping sick people alive, though not necessarily treating them, Roberts said. Obesity, which is an underlying cause of many chronic diseases, is also more widespread, she said. Obesity affects 42% of U.S. adults, according to CDC data released in 2021.
How health impacts wealth
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The concept of a health span is “increasingly important” for a household’s finances, said Stacy Francis, a certified financial planner based in New York and member of CNBC’s Advisor Council.
Adults are spending more time “living a life where they’re not in their best state,” said Francis, president and CEO of Francis Financial. “And it results in significant expenses.”
About 90% of the nation’s $4.5 trillion in annual health care costs are for people with chronic diseases and mental health conditions, according to the CDC.
Medical costs get “worse and worse” once people have a chronic ailment, Roberts said.
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The average 65-year-old retiring this year will spend about $165,000 in out-of-pocket health and medical expenses in retirement, up 5% from 2023, according to Fidelity Investments.
Out-of-pocket treatment costs and early retirements due to poor health are two big ways chronic conditions impact households financially, experts said.
Early retirement might mean claiming Social Security earlier than expected — perhaps resulting in a lower monthly benefit, said Carolyn McClanahan, a physician and CFP based in Jacksonville, Florida.
“A person’s health directly impacts their wealth — and this connection becomes even more acute as people age,” Susan Silberman, senior director of research and evaluation at the National Council on Aging, said in a 2022 briefing.
Of course, this isn’t to say healthy people avoid significant medical expenses.
They may ultimately pay more over the long term relative to an unhealthy individual if they need long-term care, for example, which can be costly and more likely with age, said McClanahan, the founder of Life Planning Partners and a member of CNBC’s Advisor Council.
Plus, healthy people experience more “go-go” years, meaning they can travel and spend on fun things, she said.
Invest in yourself
“When you are in your 40s and 50s, it’s the point of no return,” McClanahan said.
If adults don’t start tending to their health by this age, they become more susceptible to chronic diseases like diabetes and high blood pressure, which can lead to sudden issues like strokes and heart attacks, she said.
Treat purchases of healthy food, gym memberships or exercise classes as an investment in yourself, said Francis. Prioritize the spending on your health and, if it feels like too much money, try to cut back on spending that “doesn’t increase your health span,” she said.
“I think of that like an investment I put in my 401(k),” Francis said.
“Those extra dollars … will add years to your life and you’ll make up for it,” she said.
More than half of people can reverse a diabetes diagnosis by losing 10% of their weight within the first seven years of that diagnosis, Roberts said.
The “biggest tragedy” of chronic ailments is that “they’re preventable,” Roberts said. A few dietary tweaks — eliminating sugary drinks like soda and juice, and eating small, healthy snacks like an apple — can make a “dramatic difference,” she said.
“Learning to like healthy foods is actually not that difficult,” Roberts said. “Practice it for a couple weeks and be patient with yourself.”
Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO of Klarna, speaking at a fintech event in London on Monday, April 4, 2022.
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Klarna saw its losses jump in the first quarter as the popular buy now, pay later firm applies the brakes on a hotly anticipated U.S. initial public offering.
The Swedish payments startup said its net loss for the first three months of 2025 totaled $99 million — significantly worse than the $47 million loss it reported a year ago. Klarna said this was due to several one-off costs related to depreciation, share-based payments and restructuring.
Revenues at the firm increased 13% year-over-year to $701 million. Klarna said it now has 100 million active users and 724,00 merchant partners globally.
It comes as Klarna remains in pause mode regarding a highly anticipated U.S. IPO that was at one stage set to value the SoftBank-backed company at over $15 billion.
Klarna put its IPO plans on hold last month due to market turbulence caused by President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff plans. Online ticketing platform StubHub also put its IPO plans on ice.
Prior to the IPO delay, Klarna had been on a marketing blitz touting itself as an artificial intelligence-powered fintech. The company partnered up with ChatGPT maker OpenAI in 2023. A year later, Klarna used OpenAI technology to create an AI customer service assistant.
Last week, Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski said the company was able to shrink its headcount by about 40%, in part due to investments in AI.
Klarna is synonymous with the “buy now, pay later” trend of making a purchase and deferring payment until the end of the month or paying over interest-free monthly installments.
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The U.K. government on Monday laid out proposals to bring short-term loans under formal rules as it looks to clamp down on the “wild west” of the buy now, pay later sector.
Fintech firms like Klarna and Block’s Afterpay have flourished by offering interest-free financing on everything from fashion and gadgets to food deliveries — while at the same time stoking concerns around affordability. The space is highly competitive, with U.S. player Affirm launching in the U.K. just last year.
City Minister Emma Reynolds said in a statement Monday that the U.K.’s new rules were designed to tackle a sense of “wild west” in the buy now, pay later (BNPL) space, adding the measures “will protect shoppers from debt traps and give the sector the certainty it needs to invest, grow, and create jobs.”
Under the U.K. proposals, BNPL firms will be required to make upfront checks to ensure people can repay what they borrow and make it easier for customers to access refunds.
Consumers will also be able to take BNPL complaints to the Financial Ombudsman, a service created by the U.K. Parliament to settle disputes between consumers and financial services firms.
The rules are expected to come into force next year, according to the government.
Klarna said it has long supported calls to bring BNPL into the regulatory fold. “It’s good to see progress on regulation, and we look forward to working with the FCA on rules to protect consumers and encourage innovation,” a spokesperson for the company told CNBC via email.
“Regulation will give clarity and consistency to the sector, establishing a consistent operating environment and compliance standards for all providers,” spokesperson for Clearpay, the U.K. arm of Afterpay, said in an emailed statement.
“It will also create a more sustainable foundation for the future of BNPL as it continues to grow as an everyday payment option for consumers.”
While buy now, pay later firms have publicly expressed support for regulation, many were concerned about regulators applying outdated rules to their business models. The Consumer Credit Act, which regulates lending and borrowing in the U.K., has existed for over 50 years.
For its part, the government said it plans to adapt the Consumer Credit Act to allow for a “modern, pro-growth framework that reflects how people borrow today.”
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