Difference between revisions of "Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men"

Revision as of 03:27, 14 January 2022

Everywhere in the world women live longer than men - but this was not always the case. The available data from rich countries shows that women didn't live longer than men in the 19th century. What is the reason women live longer than men and why is this difference growing in the past? We only have partial evidence and the evidence isn't sufficient to support an unambiguous conclusion. We know there are behavioral, biological, and environmental factors which all play a part in women living longer than males, we aren't sure the extent to which each factor plays a role.

In spite of the amount, we can say that at a minimum, the reason women live so much longer than men do today however not as in the past, has to be due to the fact that several key non-biological factors have changed. What are these changing factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Some are more complex. For example, there is evidence that in rich countries the female advantage increased in part because infectious diseases used to affect women disproportionately a century ago, so advances in medicine that reduced the long-term health burden from infectious diseases, especially for survivors, ended up raising women's longevity disproportionately.

Everywhere in the world women tend to live longer than men
The first chart below shows life expectancy at birth for men and زيوت تطويل الشعر women. We can see that every country is above the line of parity diagonally. This implies that a baby girl from every country could anticipate to live longer than her brothers.

This graph shows that although there is a women's advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries can be significant. In Russia women are 10 years older than men. In Bhutan the gap is less than half an hour.

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In the richer countries, the advantage of women in longevity was smaller
We will now examine how the female advantage in life expectancy has changed over time. The chart below shows male and female life expectancy when they were born in the US during the period 1790-2014. Two distinct features stand out.

There is an upward trend. Women and men living in America are living longer than they used to a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The gap is widening: While the female advantage in life expectancy used to be very small, it has increased substantially over time.

You can verify that these points are also applicable to other countries with data by clicking on the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.