Murder. Intrigue. And a financial product that bets on the death of people you don’t know. Tontines!

Welcome to the Insurance vs History Podcast! In this episode, I dig into the rise and fall of the tontine, a unique life insurance product that includes a mortality lottery. How did a financial product build bridges and real estate, fund wars, and even contribute to the French revolution? I'm talking Kings, Insurance Barons, and estimating who would live longest. What could be more exciting?

Sources and Links:

Books:

• com: King William's Tontine: Why the Retirement Annuity of the Future Should Resemble its Past (Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics (Hardcover)): 9781107076129: Milevsky, Moshe A.: Books Milevsky has a nice history of tontines in here, and then a discussion of the math and how he thinks a tontine could work. If you’re an actuary, you probably will understand the math, but laypeople likely will not.
• com: The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity eBook : Gratton, Lynda, Scott, Andrew J.: Kindle Store The book that prompted the interest in tontines in Japan.
• Betting On Lives: The Culture of Life Insurance in England, 1695-1775 (Politics, Culture and Society in Early Modern Britain): Clark, Geoffrey: 9780719056758: Amazon.com: Books

Articles:

• Japan’s Aging Population Breathes New Life Into a Centuries-Old Investment Idea - WSJ (behind a paywall, sorry)
• The Tontine Principle - Historic UK (historic-uk.com) Short overview of using tontines for smaller public works projects or private projects
• Tontine Thinking - The Actuary Magazine Article by Moshe Milevsky if you don’t want to read the book
• It’s sleazy, it’s totally illegal, and yet it could become the future of retirement - The Washington Post Well, I wouldn’t go exactly that far, but okay, Washington Post, hit that clickbait.
• The Tontine Coffee House (narratively.com)
• Alexander Hamilton's Tontine Proposal on JSTOR by Robert M. Jennings, Donald F. Swanson and Andrew P. Trout
• Tontine Insurance and the Armstrong Investigation: A Case of Stifled Innovation, 1868-1905 on JSTOR by Roger L. Ransom and Richard Sutch

Music Credits:

• Boulangerie by Jeremy Sherman, courtesy of NeoSounds: Boulangerie, LynneMusic | NeoSounds music library

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