I believe it’s the better choice for a young person.
Less demands to give it away to friends, family and strangers.
Less opportunities for reckless spending.
Nice stable baseline, lifetime income.
Good opportunities for systemic long term investments.
In the case of my wife her temptation to give one time (relatively) large sums to charity or family would have been very great.
With the annuity she can still give—but in small amounts—and can revisit her decision every single month.
The human factor is very important—number crunching is just one piece of the decision making.