Goldens are wonderful family dogs. We had three over 25 yr as my kids came and grew up. Problem now is extensive breeding has resulted in a relative short life compared to 50 yr ago. The biggie is that an estimated 65% of Goldens will die of cancer. Purdue University has a large NIH funded research program to study genetic linkage of cancer in Goldens.
That seems to be the case in all breeds.
We lost a Schnauzer (also a great breed) to cancer not long ago.
When I was a child we always had dogs. None of them died of cancer that we know of but recently I was in the vets office and a poster on the wall had a chart of life expectancy of dogs in relationship to their size and it said all dogs have about a 40% chance of dying of cancer.