Why Women Are More Likely To Live 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 so much longer than men today and how have these advantages gotten bigger over time? There is only limited evidence and the evidence isn't sufficient to support an absolute conclusion. While we are aware that there are biological, psychological and environmental variables that all play a role in women living longer than men, we do not know the extent to which each factor plays a role.

It is known that women are living longer than males, regardless of weight. However this is not due to the fact that certain non-biological factors have changed. What are these new factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Others 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 العاب زوجية (glorynote.com) men and women. We can see that every country is above the line of parity diagonally. This means that a newborn girl in every country can be expected to live for العاب زوجية longer than her younger brother.

This chart shows that, even though women enjoy an advantage in all countries, the differences across countries can be substantial. In Russia, women live 10 years more than men. In Bhutan, the difference is less than half a calendar year.

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The advantage for women in life expectancy was less in rich countries than it is today.
Let's see how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The following chart shows the male and female life expectancy at the time of birth in the US between 1790 to 2014. Two specific points stand out.

The first is that there is an upward trend. Women and men living in America are living longer than they did 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is widening: While the female advantage in life expectancy was once quite small, it has increased substantially over time.

You can check if these principles are also applicable to other countries with data by clicking the "Change country" option in the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.