Why 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 is the reason women live much longer than men today and how has this advantage increased over time? The evidence isn't conclusive and we only have partial solutions. We know there are behavioral, biological and environmental factors that play an integral role in women living longer than males, we aren't sure how much each factor contributes.

We have learned that women live longer than males, regardless of weight. But it is not because of certain biological factors have changed. What 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 اوضاع الجماع 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 over the line of parity diagonally. This means that a newborn girl in all countries can anticipate to live longer than her younger brother.

This chart shows that, although women have an advantage in all countries, the differences across countries could be significant. 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 smaller in countries with higher incomes that it is today.
Let's examine how the gender advantage in longevity has changed over time. The following chart shows the male and female life expectancy at birth in the US in the years 1790-2014. Two specific points stand out.

First, there's an upward trend. Both men as well as women in the US live much, much longer than they did 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

And second, there is a widening gap: The female advantage in terms of life expectancy used to be quite small, but it grew substantially over the last century.

When you click on the option "Change country in the chart, confirm that the two points apply to other countries with available data: Sweden, France and the UK.