US. Covid-19 Makes Racial And Class Status Longevity Gaps Worse
Everyone knows the poor die sooner than the rich. Some humans can live past 90, but many don’t have access to the health and wealth that lets humans live a normal human life span. In the last 20 years, all longevity gains for Americans have gone to those in the upper half of the income distribution.
Boston University researchers Jacob Bor, Gregory Cohen and Sandro Galea found that income and education gaps in life expectancy widened during the period 1980–2014. Life expectancy for white women without a high school diploma actually declined. “Since 2001, the poorest 5% of Americans experienced close to zero gains in survival. At the same time, middle-income and high-income Americans have gained over 2 years in additional life expectancy.”
Before the pandemic the class and race gap in longevity was getting worse. In 1950, age-65 life expectancy for Black and white men was equal— each could expect to live about 12.8 more years if they had reached 65. Now there is a 2-year difference (moreover, 81% of white men make it to 65 compared to just 70% of Black men). The only wrinkle in the class-based story was that Latinos had an advantage, even though they were low income. Foreign-born Hispanic men can expect to live 3.2 years longer than their U.S.-born counterparts.
Read more @Forbes
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