Credit: Illustration: Christine Daniloff/MIT
Poverty in the U.S. is often associated with deprivation, in areas including housing, employment, and education. Now a study co-authored by two MIT researchers has shown, in unprecedented geographic detail, another stark reality: Poor people live shorter lives, too.
More precisely, the study shows that in the U.S., the richest 1 percent of men lives 14.6 years longer on average than the poorest 1 percent of men, while among women in those wealth percentiles, the difference is 10.1 years on average. (emphasis added)
This eye-opening gap is also growing rapidly: Over roughly the last 15 years, life expectancy increased by 2.34 years for men and 2.91 years for women who are among the top 5 percent of income earners in America, but by just 0.32 and 0.04 years for men and women in the bottom 5 percent of the income tables.
“When we think about income inequality in the United States, we think that low-income Americans can’t afford to purchase the same homes, live in the same neighborhoods, and buy the […]
At a first glance the findings are fully compatible with recent definition of health. I would be most interested to know whether this compatibility also is given, when looking at details. Could the data be explained in more detail with the help of this definition?
Johannes Bircher MD
Bircher J and Hahn EG. Understanding the nature of health: New perspectives for medicine and public health.
Improved wellbeing at lower costs [version 1; referees: 1 approved] F1000Research 2016, 5:167 (doi: 10.12688/f1000research.7849.1)
Thanks Johannes, I will track this down and read it with interest.
— Stephan