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Working Longer May Mean Living Longer, Study Says

BOSTON (CBS) – If you want to keep living, keep working.

Retiring at age 65 may not be the healthiest thing for you, according to a new study.

Researchers at Oregon State University looked at data from 1992 to 2010 and found that those who stayed on the job past the traditional retirement age lived longer.

They claim there's an eleven-percent decrease in the risk of death for healthy people who worked a year past 65, because their minds and bodies stay active.

As for unhealthy people who kept working beyond retirement age, they had a 9-percent lower risk of death.

"The healthy group is generally more advantaged in terms of education, wealth, health behaviors and lifestyle, but taking all of those issues into account, the pattern still remained," Robert Stawski, senior author of the paper, said in a statement. "The findings seem to indicate that people who remain active and engaged gain a benefit from that."

Stawski called the research the "tip of the iceberg."

"We see the relationship between work and longevity, but we don't know everything about people's lives, health and well-being after retirement that could be influencing their longevity."

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