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The Last Known Person Born in the 19th Century Dies in Japan at 117 (kottke.org)
Jason Kottke: As of 2015, only two women born in the 1800s and two others born in 1900 (the last year of the 19th century) were still alive. In the next two years, three of those women passed away, including Jamaican Violet Brown, the last living subject of Queen Victoria, who reigned over the British Empire starting in 1837. Last week Nabi Tajima, the last known survivor of the 19th century, died in Japan at age 117.
But does it matter? Year 1 on the calendar wasn't determined until 5 centuries later by Dionysius Exiguus. Since they didn't start talking about decades and a meaningful way until modern journalism and history probably in the later half of the last century, it's not like we are tracking 200+ decades of information.
The whole point is to classify and organize things for telling stories. But largely, referring to the 80's, you are providing generalities (ie, cultural trends, politics, generational changes, etc) about a significant chunk of time. If that's the case, does it really matter to say 'we must begin at year 1, and include the next year that ends in a 0 in each decade. Because if I'm talking about the 1980s, I'm talking about the 10 years that begin 198, meaning 1980-1989. 1990 is not a year where the 3rd digit is 8 and the last three digits are in the 80s mathematically.
So on a decade level, it's much easier and more convenient to refer to decades as short hand by 80's instead of being pedantic and forcing everybody to say 1981-1990 since I will protest as loud as you if somebody demands including 1990 in the decade referred to as the 80's.
And if we are going to talk about decades and centuries, which is done primarily by historians and journalists, I don't mind them using a little short hand and making a slightly inaccurate convention that says decades are a period that have first 3 digits of the years the same, and centuries are all the years that have first two digits the same. It's convenient, and who cares if the first decade and century are short by one year. Nobody really discusses the first century and worries about whether year 100 was first century or second.
So, give it a rest, let the historians and journalists do their job, and don't worry, because there is no rule that says decades or centuries must start with year 1 or a probe will be thrown off course because of poor measurement, and we don't need everything counted like we are measuring something like an engineer or scientist. The whole point is classifying the messiness that is human existence and interaction, and who cares if the classification of decades and centuries if off by 1?