Citing a single outlier does not change the prospects of an academic researcher going into longevity work.
Novartis[1], the pharmaceutical company, who ranked number one in world-wide sales in 2013 is working on a longevity drug based on rapamycin.
Elizabeth Blackburn got a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, in 2009, for her work on telomeres!
Quite frankly: lulz!
[0] http://www.elysiumhealth.com/team [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novartis
I've linked to a page of academics from top institutions[0]. If you're at Harvard researching longevity, then you're doing OK career-wise, imho.
If you sell your company for $720 million, you're doing OK career-wise, imo.
Demonstrably, you're incorrect.