Gender Inequality in Survival at Older Ages

Sanderson, W. & Scherbov, S. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0881-1073 (2017). Gender Inequality in Survival at Older Ages. IIASA Working Paper. IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria: WP-17-002

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Abstract

Gender gaps are typically measured by subtracting the survival rates for women from that of men. In most countries and at most ages, these gender gaps indicate a survival rate disadvantage for men. This method is not informative because it is unclear whether larger or smaller gaps would be more equitable. Here we reconceptualize the gender gap in survival based on differences from gender-specific best practice rates and express those gender gaps in the metric years of age. If the age-specific survival rates for women in a particular country are farther behind the best-practice survival rates for women than the survival rates for men are behind their best-practice rates, then there is a gender gap to the disadvantage of women. This facilitates the analysis of gender gaps over ages, time periods and countries. We find that there has not generally been a trend toward gender equality in survival when measured relative to gender-specific best practice. In some countries, gender gaps in survival to the disadvantage of women existed in 1960 and have even grown larger over time. In the UK, gender gaps to the disadvantage of men in 1960 evolved into gender gaps to the disadvantage of women by 2010.

The methodology employed here can be applied to quantify gender gaps in a variety of variables and help in the formulation of healthcare policies.

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