IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/24929.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Evolution of Longevity: Evidence from Canada

Author

Listed:
  • Kevin Milligan
  • Tammy Schirle

Abstract

We find a steep earnings-longevity gradient using fifty years of administrative data from Canada, with men in the top ventile of earnings living eight years (11 percent) longer than those in the bottom ventile. For women, the difference is 3.6 years. Unlike the United States, this longevity gradient in Canada has shifted uniformly through time, with approximately equal gains across the earnings distribution. We compare our results using cross-sectional and cohort-based methods, finding similar trends but a steeper gradient when using cohorts. For middle-aged men, we find a cessation of mortality improvements in recent years, comparable to changes observed in the United States. Changes in income do not explain cross-time or cross-country differences.

Suggested Citation

  • Kevin Milligan & Tammy Schirle, 2018. "The Evolution of Longevity: Evidence from Canada," NBER Working Papers 24929, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24929
    Note: AG
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w24929.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hilary Hoynes & Mark Stabile, 2019. "How Do the US and Canadian Social Safety Nets Compare for Women and Children?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S2), pages 253-288.
    2. Anne Case & Angus Deaton, 2017. "Mortality and Morbidity in the 21st Century," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 48(1 (Spring), pages 397-476.
    3. David Cutler & Angus Deaton & Adriana Lleras-Muney, 2006. "The Determinants of Mortality," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 20(3), pages 97-120, Summer.
    4. Donna Feir & Randall Akee, 2019. "First Peoples lost: Determining the state of status First Nations mortality in Canada using administrative data," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(2), pages 490-525, May.
    5. Finkelstein, Amy & McKnight, Robin, 2008. "What did Medicare do? The initial impact of Medicare on mortality and out of pocket medical spending," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(7), pages 1644-1668, July.
    6. Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt, 2016. "Mortality Inequality: The Good News from a County-Level Approach," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 30(2), pages 29-52, Spring.
    7. Kevin Milligan & Tammy Schirle, 2019. "Push and Pull: Disability Insurance, Regional Labor Markets, and Benefit Generosity in Canada and the United States," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S2), pages 289-323.
    8. Orazio P. Attanasio & Hilary Williamson Hoynes, 2000. "Differential Mortality and Wealth Accumulation," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 35(1), pages 1-29.
    9. Alan J. Auerbach & Kerwin K. Charles & Courtney C. Coile & William Gale & Dana Goldman & Ronald Lee & Charles M. Lucas & Peter R. Orszag & Louise M. Sheiner & Bryan Tysinger & David N. Weil & Justin W, 2017. "How the Growing Gap in Life Expectancy May Affect Retirement Benefits and Reforms," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan;The Geneva Association, vol. 42(3), pages 475-499, July.
    10. Sarah Miller & Norman Johnson & Laura R Wherry, 2021. "Medicaid and Mortality: New Evidence From Linked Survey and Administrative Data," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 136(3), pages 1783-1829.
    11. James E Duggan & Robert Gillingham & John S Greenlees, 2008. "Mortality and Lifetime Income: Evidence from U.S. Social Security Records," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 55(4), pages 566-594, December.
    12. Boisclair, David & Duclos, Jean-Yves & Marchand, Steeve & Michaud, Pierre-Carl, 2015. "Une analyse Économique de propositions visant à bonifier la couverture du risque de longévité," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 91(4), pages 499-530, Décembre.
    13. Leonid Gavrilov & Natalia Gavrilova, 2011. "Mortality Measurement at Advanced Ages," North American Actuarial Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(3), pages 432-447.
    14. James Vaupel & Kenneth Manton & Eric Stallard, 1979. "The impact of heterogeneity in individual frailty on the dynamics of mortality," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 16(3), pages 439-454, August.
    15. Cutler, David M. & Lange, Fabian & Meara, Ellen & Richards-Shubik, Seth & Ruhm, Christopher J., 2011. "Rising educational gradients in mortality: The role of behavioral risk factors," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 1174-1187.
    16. Harriet Duleep, 1989. "Measuring socioeconomic mortality differentials over time," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 26(2), pages 345-351, May.
    17. Michael Baker & Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt, 2019. "Mortality Inequality in Canada and the United States: Divergent or Convergent Trends?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 37(S2), pages 325-353.
    18. Hanratty, Maria J, 1996. "Canadian National Health Insurance and Infant Health," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(1), pages 276-284, March.
    19. Anne Case & Angua Deaton, 2015. "Rising morbidity and mortality in midlife among white non-Hispanic Americans in the 21st century," Working Papers 15078.full.pdf, Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Research Program in Development Studies..
    20. repec:nas:journl:v:115:y:2018:p:11754-11759 is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. James Banks & Janet Currie & Sonya Krutikova & Kjell G. Salvanes & Hannes Schwandt, 2021. "The Evolution of Mortality Inequality in 11 OECD Countries: Introduction," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(1), pages 9-23, March.
    2. Jan L. M. Dhaene & Moshe A. Milevsky, 2024. "Egalitarian pooling and sharing of longevity risk', a.k.a. 'The many ways to skin a tontine cat," Papers 2402.00855, arXiv.org.
    3. Guy Lacroix & Francois Laliberté‐Auger & Pierre‐Carl Michaud & Daniel Parent, 2021. "The effect of college education on health and mortality: Evidence from Canada," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(S1), pages 105-118, November.
    4. Franca Glenzer & Pierre-Carl Michaud & Stefan Staubli, 2023. "Frames, Incentives, and Education: Effectiveness of Interventions to Delay Public Pension Claiming," CIRANO Working Papers 2023s-05, CIRANO.
    5. Marie Connolly & Akakpo Domefa-Konou & Marie-Louise Leroux, 2023. "Evaluating the relationship between income, survival and loss of autonomy among older Canadians," CIRANO Working Papers 2023s-04, CIRANO.
    6. Adriana Lleras‐Muney, 2022. "Education and income gradients in longevity: The role of policy," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 55(1), pages 5-37, February.
    7. Milevsky, Moshe A., 2020. "Swimming with wealthy sharks: longevity, volatility and the value of risk pooling," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(2), pages 217-246, April.
    8. Brant Abbott & Giovanni Gallipoli, 2018. "Human Capital Inequality: Empirical Evidence," Working Papers 2018-085, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    9. Kevin Milligan & Tammy Schirle, 2018. "Rich Man, Poor Man: The Policy Implications of Canadians Living Longer," e-briefs 282, C.D. Howe Institute.
    10. Frank T Denton & Byron G Spencer & Terry A Yip, 2019. "Age-Income Dynamics Over The Life Course: Cohort Transition Patterns In Relative Income Based On Canadian Tax Returns," Department of Economics Working Papers 2019-02, McMaster University.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Leive, Adam A. & Ruhm, Christopher J., 2021. "Has mortality risen disproportionately for the least educated?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    2. Hudomiet, Péter & Hurd, Michael D. & Rohwedder, Susann, 2021. "Forecasting mortality inequalities in the U.S. based on trends in midlife health," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    3. Adriana Lleras-Muney & Joseph Price & Dahai Yue, 2020. "The Association Between Educational Attainment and Longevity using Individual Level Data from the 1940 Census," NBER Working Papers 27514, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Aline Bütikofer & René Karadakic & Kjell G. Salvanes, 2021. "Income Inequality and Mortality: A Norwegian Perspective," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(1), pages 193-221, March.
    5. Cristina Borra & Jerònia Pons-Pons & Margarita Vilar-Rodríguez, 2020. "Austerity, healthcare provision, and health outcomes in Spain," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 21(3), pages 409-423, April.
    6. Haan, Peter & Kemptner, Daniel & Lüthen, Holger, 2020. "The rising longevity gap by lifetime earnings – Distributional implications for the pension system," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 17(C).
    7. Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt & Josselin Thuilliez, 2020. "Pauvreté, Egalité, Mortalité: mortality (in)equality in France and the United States," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 197-231, January.
    8. Fabrizio Culotta, 2021. "Life Expectancy Heterogeneity and Pension Fairness: An Italian North-South Divide," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-22, March.
    9. Black, Bernard & Hollingsworth, Alex & Nunes, Letícia & Simon, Kosali, 2022. "Simulated power analyses for observational studies: An application to the Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansion," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 213(C).
    10. Hui Zheng, 2020. "Unobserved population heterogeneity and dynamics of health disparities," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 43(34), pages 1009-1048.
    11. Mauro Caselli & Paolo Falco, 2020. "As long as they are cheap. Experimental evidence on the demand for migrant workers," Discussion Papers 20-06, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics.
    12. Dow, Wiiliam H & Godoey, Anna & Lowenstein, Christopher A & Reich, Michael, 2019. "Can Economic Policies Reduce Deaths of Despair? Working Paper #104-19," Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, Working Paper Series qt14f015df, Institute of Industrial Relations, UC Berkeley.
    13. Dow, William H. & Godøy, Anna & Lowenstein, Christopher & Reich, Michael, 2020. "Can Labor Market Policies Reduce Deaths of Despair?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    14. Dobis, Elizabeth A. & Stephens, Heather M. & Skidmore, Mark & Goetz, Stephan J., 2020. "Explaining the spatial variation in American life expectancy," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 246(C).
    15. Dora L. Costa, 2015. "Health and the Economy in the United States from 1750 to the Present," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 53(3), pages 503-570, September.
    16. James Banks & Janet Currie & Sonya Krutikova & Kjell G. Salvanes & Hannes Schwandt, 2021. "The Evolution of Mortality Inequality in 11 OECD Countries: Introduction," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(1), pages 9-23, March.
    17. David McCarthy, 2021. "80 will be the new 70: Old‐age mortality postponement in the United States and its likely effect on the finances of the OASI program," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 88(2), pages 381-412, June.
    18. Borgschulte, Mark & Vogler, Jacob, 2020. "Did the ACA Medicaid expansion save lives?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    19. Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt & Josselin Thuilliez, 2020. "Pauvreté, Egalité, Mortalité: mortality (in)equality in France and the United States," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 197-231, January.
    20. Lucy Xiaolu Wang, 2021. "The complementarity of drug monitoring programs and health IT for reducing opioid‐related mortality and morbidity," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(9), pages 2026-2046, September.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I14 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Inequality
    • J11 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Demographic Trends, Macroeconomic Effects, and Forecasts
    • J14 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of the Elderly; Economics of the Handicapped; Non-Labor Market Discrimination

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24929. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.