The Future Human Lifespan: A Study on Italian Population

Abstract

In the latter part of the 20th century, continued improvements in living standards, health behaviors, and medical care reduced mortality and produced amazing advances in life expectancy. These trends, followed by all industrial nations, decidedly affect the financial position of an insurance company, interested in the construction of updated life tables. The approach to this problem is faced in this paper by using the Lee-Carter methodology. In particular, in the present work, we are interested in modeling and forecasting mortality and life expectancy on a period basis through the use of a stochastic forecasting method which uses time-series models to make long-term forecasts.