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 have a longer life span than men? And how has this advantage gotten larger over time? The evidence is sketchy and we're only able to provide partial solutions. While we are aware that there are biological, psychological and environmental variables that all play a role in women's longevity more than men, we don't know what percentage each factor plays in.

In spite of the precise number of pounds, we know that at least part of the reason women live longer than men today, but not in the past, has to have to do with the fact that several important non-biological aspects have changed. These factors are changing. 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 women. We can see that every country is over the diagonal line of parity. This implies that a baby girl from every country could expect to live longer than her brothers.

The chart below shows that although women have an advantage in all countries, the differences across countries can be substantial. In Russia, women live 10 years longer than males. In Bhutan there is a difference of just half a year.

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In the richer countries, the women's advantage in longevity used to be smaller
Let's 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 at the time of birth in the US between 1790 to 2014. Two areas stand out.

First, there's an upward trend. Men as well as women in the US live a lot, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, there's an increasing gap: The female advantage in life expectancy used be extremely small, but it grew substantially during the last century.

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