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 is this difference growing as time passes? The evidence is limited and we only have incomplete solutions. While we are aware that there are biological, behavioral, and environmental factors that play an integral role in women's longevity more than men, we do not know how much each factor contributes.

In spite of how much amount, we can say that at least part of the reason why women live longer than men do today, but not previously, is to do with the fact that a number of key non-biological factors have changed. What are these factors that have changed? Some are well known and Dostoyanieplaneti.ru/?option=com_k2&view=itemlist&task=user&id=7284455 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, all countries are above the diagonal parity line , which means that in every country that a baby girl can be expected to live for longer than a new boy.1

This chart is interesting in that it shows that while the female advantage exists everywhere, the cross-country differences are large. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan there is a difference of just half a year.

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In countries with high incomes, the longevity advantage for women was smaller
Let's see how the female longevity advantage 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 distinct points stand out.

First, there is an upward trend. Men and women in America live longer than they were a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is increasing: While the advantage of women in life expectancy used to be very small however, it has grown significantly over time.

Using the option 'Change country by country' in the chart, you are able to determine if these two points are also applicable to the other countries with available information: Sweden, France and the UK.