Why Are Women Living Longer Than Men

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's the reason women are more likely to live longer than men? And why does this benefit increase in the past? We only have partial evidence and the evidence is not sufficient to support an informed conclusion. We know that biological, behavioral and environmental factors all contribute to the fact that women have longer lives than men, However, we're not sure how significant the impact to each of these variables is.

We have learned that women live longer than males, regardless of weight. But this is not due to the fact that certain non-biological factors have changed. These are the factors that are changing. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. There are other issues that are more intricate. 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 women. As you can see, all countries are above the diagonal line of parity - it means that in all nations the newborn girl is likely to live for اضيق وضعية للجماع longer than a newborn boy.1

This chart is interesting in that it shows that, while the advantage for women exists across all countries, the global differences are significant. In Russia women live for 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan the gap is less that half a year.

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In rich countries the female advantage in longevity was smaller
Let's now look at how the advantage of women in terms of longevity has changed over time. The following chart shows the male and female life expectancy when they were born in the US in the years 1790 until 2014. Two points stand out.

There is an upward trend. Both genders in America have longer lives than they were a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The gap is getting wider: Although the female advantage in life expectancy used to be tiny It has significantly increased over time.

It is possible to verify that these points are also applicable to other countries with data by clicking the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, France, and اضيق وضعية للجماع Sweden.