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 main reason women have a longer life span than men? Why does this benefit increase in the past? The evidence isn't conclusive and we have only partial solutions. Although we know that there are behavioral, biological and environmental variables that all play a role in the longevity of women over males, we aren't sure how much each one contributes.

We are aware that women live longer than males, regardless of weight. However this is not because of certain non-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. There are other issues that are more intricate. 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 above the line of parity diagonally. This implies that a baby girl from every country could be expected to live for longer than her brother.

The chart below shows that although women have an advantage everywhere, cross-country differences can be substantial. In Russia women have an average of 10 years more than males; while in Bhutan the gap is just half a year.

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In countries with high incomes, the longevity advantage for women was smaller
Let's take a look at how the female longevity advantage has changed over time. The next chart shows male and female life expectancies at birth in the US between 1790 and 2014. Two distinct points stand out.

There is an upward trend. Both men and women in the US live much, ماذا يحدث بين الزوجين في الحمام بالصور much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The gap is widening: While the advantage of women in life expectancy was once tiny It has significantly increased with time.

If you select the option "Change country' on the chart, determine if these two points apply to other countries that have available information: Sweden, France and the UK.