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. Why do women live longer than men in the present and how does this benefit increase over time? The evidence is sketchy and we're left with only some solutions. While we are aware that there are biological, behavioral as well as environmental factors that play an integral role in women who live longer than men, we do not know what percentage each factor plays in.

We have learned that women are living longer than men, regardless of their weight. But this isn't because of certain biological or 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. There are others 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. We can see that every country is over the line of parity diagonally. This means that a newborn girl from every country could anticipate to live longer than her brothers.

This chart shows that, while there is a female advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries can be significant. In Russia women have an average of 10 years more than men. In Bhutan the gap is less than half one year.

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In wealthy countries, the female advantage in longevity was previously smaller.
Let's see how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The next chart plots male and female life expectancy when they were born in the US between 1790 and 2014. Two points stand العاب زوجية out.

First, there's an upward trend. Both men as well as women in the US are living much, much longer than they did 100 years 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 was once tiny however, it has grown significantly over time.

By selecting 'Change Country by country' in the chart, you can verify that these two points also apply to other countries that have available information: Sweden, France and the UK.