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 why women have a longer life span than men? What is the reason the advantage has grown over time? There is only limited evidence and the evidence is not sufficient to reach an informed conclusion. We know that biological, behavioral and environmental factors play a role in the fact that women have longer life spans than men, However, we're not sure how significant the impact of each factor is.

We know that women are living longer than men, regardless of their weight. But, this is not because of certain biological factors have changed. What are these factors that have changed? 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. We can see that all countries are above the diagonal parity line ; which means that in every country baby girls can expect to live longer than a new boy.1

This graph shows that even though women enjoy an advantage across all countries, differences between countries could be significant. In Russia, العاب زوجية women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan, the difference is only half a year.

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The advantage for women in life expectancy was less in countries with higher incomes than it is today.
Let's examine how the advantage of women in longevity has changed with time. The following chart shows the life expectancy of males and females at birth in the US during the time period between 1790 and 2014. Two distinct features stand out.

First, there is an upward trend. Men and women living in America are living longer than they used to 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is widening: While the advantage of women in life expectancy was quite small It has significantly increased in the past.

Using the option 'Change country' on the chart, العاب زوجية (glorynote.com) you will be able to confirm that the two points are also applicable to other countries with available information: Sweden, France and the UK.