Why Do Women 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. What's the reason women live longer than men? What is the reason the advantage has grown in the past? The evidence isn't conclusive and we're only able to provide incomplete solutions. We know there are behavioral, biological as well as environmental factors which play a significant role in the longevity of women over males, we aren't sure how much each one contributes.

In spite of how much weight, we know that at a minimum, the reason why women live longer than men today but not previously, has to be due to the fact that a number of key 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. Others are more complicated. 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 we can see, every country is above the diagonal parity line ; this means that in all countries that a baby girl can be expected to live for longer than a new boy.1

This chart shows that, even though women enjoy an advantage in all countries, the differences across countries can be significant. In Russia women are 10 years older than men; in Bhutan the difference is just half an hour.

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In countries with high incomes, the longevity advantage for women used to be smaller
Let's examine how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The chart below illustrates the gender-based and female-specific life expectancy at the birth in the US between 1790-2014. Two specific points stand out.

First, there's an upward trend: Men and كيفية إقامة علاقة بالصور women in the US live much, much longer than they did a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The second is that there is a widening gap: The female advantage in terms of life expectancy used be very modest however it increased dramatically in the past century.

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