Feb
27
Cryonic Estate Planning: Will You Be Financially Prepared When They Wake You Up?
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iceCryonics-- having your body cryogenically frozen – seeks to keep either your head (neurocryopreservation) or full body suspended until medical technology advances to the extent that there is a method to revive you in the future. Cryonics vendors already exist and have a price tag on the process itself as well as standby (end-stage care of the human body) and long-term storage. This makes us wonder:  what happens when you are actually revived? Will you have the means to have necessary medical procedures performed? The funds and/or currency to live in an economy of the future? What happens to your estate after cryonics??

Enter “Cryonic Estate Planning” (yes this is apparently a thing).  Cryonic Estate Planning will use a Personal Revival Trust that lasts in perpetuity, until the grantor is awakened. The market has had to overcome a couple of obstacles, however, in order to make these valid. Many states have a “Rule Against Perpetuity,” meaning you cannot suspend ownership indefinitely into the future.  For example, perpetuities are illegal in some states except when they support a charitable cause, although many states have recently repealed these laws. There have also been arguments that a trust is invalid without a beneficiary. A common workaround is to name the cryonics vendor as a beneficiary who will be paid from the income of the trust. Or, the cryopreservervation company may be named as a beneficiary in a life insurance policy. 

So now that there is a way of retaining assets for when you are revived, the question is how much is going to be enough? And what does "revival" actually mean? Does this include any standard of care afterwards? Transitional services that will acclimate you to future society? For every question that emerges, there is a business opportunity. And your target market for such services would include Simon Cowell and Larrys King and Flynt, to name a few. 

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