A new study co-authored by two University of Wisconsin-Madison professors suggests longevity gains across states and territories for people born between 1941 and 2000, contrary to earlier estimates that suggested a century of stagnation or even decline in parts of the South.
Published in the journal BMJ Open, the study by Héctor Pifarré i Arolas and Jason Fletcher of the La Follette School of Public Affairs, along with José Andrade of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, challenges recent estimates that depicted progress in extending longevity in the United States as sharply divergent between states and regions.
Using new data from the United States Mortality Database, their updated analyzes suggest a significantly smaller difference in longevity gains since the mid-20th century than a recent paper led by Theodore Holford of the Yale School of Public Health and colleagues. Rather than a simple story of steady divergence, the new study describes a more complex two-phase pattern: rapid convergence in the middle of the century, when Southern states were making up lost ground with much of the rest of the country driven largely by gains in child survival in the South—followed by a second phase in which that convergence followed the second half of the 20th century.
Our projections show universal gains in cohort life expectancy between 1941 and 2000 for all birth cohorts, sexes, and states. States are not expected to have equal gains in longevity, and convergence across states appears to have stalled since the 1950s, but we find no evidence of the radical increase in inequalities across states suggested by some earlier estimates.’
Héctor Pifarré i Arolas, La Follette School of Public Affairs
Holford’s work argues that many Southern states saw little gain or even declines in cohort life expectancy in the second half of the 20th century, while states like New York saw rapid gains, widening disparities between states. The new paper challenges these assumptions.
For example, Holford’s paper estimated that Mississippi did not experience a female longevity increase for over 50 years, while the updated data in the BMJ Open study found about 7 years.
By exploring regional and state-specific trends, the authors hope this research will lead to an increased understanding of the key drivers of longevity gains, as US states varied significantly in populations and policies during this period. “Understanding that all states experienced gains—especially the significant improvements in the South earlier in the century—helps shift the conversation toward what led to those successes and why progress has slowed since then. That’s where the real policy lessons lie,” says Fletcher. In the context of slowing longevity gains in high-income countries, as suggested in recent work by Pifarré i Arolas, Andrade and colleagues, the study adds to a growing body of research using birth cohorts and forecasting methods to elucidate how policies and living conditions can contribute to longer or shorter lives.
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