TY - JOUR
T1 - Diverging trends in cause-specific mortality and life years lost by educational attainment
T2 - Evidence from United States vital statistics data, 1990-2010
AU - Sasson, Isaac
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Isaac Sasson. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2016/10
Y1 - 2016/10
N2 - Background Life expectancy at birth in the United States will likely surpass 80 years in the coming decade. Yet recent studies suggest that longevity gains are unevenly shared across age and socioeconomic groups. First, mortality in midlife has risen among non-Hispanic whites. Second, low-educated whites have suffered stalls (men) or declines (women) in adult life expectancy, which is significantly lower than among their college-educated counterparts. Estimating the number of life years lost or gained by age and cause of death, broken down by educational attainment, is crucial in identifying vulnerable populations. Methods and Findings Using U.S. vital statistics data from 1990 to 2010, this study decomposes the change in life expectancy at age 25 by age and cause of death across educational attainment groups, broken down by race and gender. The findings reveal that mortality in midlife increased for white women (and to a lesser extent men) with 12 or fewer years of schooling, accounting for most of the stalls or declines in adult life expectancy observed in those groups. Among blacks, mortality declined in nearly all age and educational attainment groups. Although an educational gradient was found across multiple causes of death, between 60 and 80 percent of the gap in adult life expectancy was explained by cardiovascular diseases, smoking- related diseases, and external causes of death. Furthermore, the number of life years lost to smoking-related, external, and other causes of death increased among low- and high school-educated whites, explaining recent stalls or declines in longevity. Conclusions Large segments of the American population - particularly low- and high school-educated whites under age 55 - are diverging from their college-educated counterparts and losing additional years of life to smoking-related diseases and external causes of death. If this trend continues, old-age mortality may also increase for these birth cohorts in the coming decades.
AB - Background Life expectancy at birth in the United States will likely surpass 80 years in the coming decade. Yet recent studies suggest that longevity gains are unevenly shared across age and socioeconomic groups. First, mortality in midlife has risen among non-Hispanic whites. Second, low-educated whites have suffered stalls (men) or declines (women) in adult life expectancy, which is significantly lower than among their college-educated counterparts. Estimating the number of life years lost or gained by age and cause of death, broken down by educational attainment, is crucial in identifying vulnerable populations. Methods and Findings Using U.S. vital statistics data from 1990 to 2010, this study decomposes the change in life expectancy at age 25 by age and cause of death across educational attainment groups, broken down by race and gender. The findings reveal that mortality in midlife increased for white women (and to a lesser extent men) with 12 or fewer years of schooling, accounting for most of the stalls or declines in adult life expectancy observed in those groups. Among blacks, mortality declined in nearly all age and educational attainment groups. Although an educational gradient was found across multiple causes of death, between 60 and 80 percent of the gap in adult life expectancy was explained by cardiovascular diseases, smoking- related diseases, and external causes of death. Furthermore, the number of life years lost to smoking-related, external, and other causes of death increased among low- and high school-educated whites, explaining recent stalls or declines in longevity. Conclusions Large segments of the American population - particularly low- and high school-educated whites under age 55 - are diverging from their college-educated counterparts and losing additional years of life to smoking-related diseases and external causes of death. If this trend continues, old-age mortality may also increase for these birth cohorts in the coming decades.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84991261543&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0163412
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0163412
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C2 - 27701419
AN - SCOPUS:84991261543
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 11
JO - PLoS ONE
JF - PLoS ONE
IS - 10
M1 - e0163412
ER -