Income, Life-Expectancy Study: Yep, Rich People Live Longer

A new income and life expectancy study confirms that the rich are living longer than the poor, across the board, but the differences vary depending on location, according to The New York Times.

The study published Sunday in the Journal of the American Medical Association looked at life expectancy in the United States from 2001 to 2014. The study measured the level, time trend, and geographic variables in the association between income and life expectancy.

"In the United States between 2001 and 2014, higher income was associated with greater longevity and differences in life expectancy across income groups increased over time," said the study's conclusion.

"However, the association between life expectancy and income varied substantially across areas; differences in longevity across income groups decreased in some areas and increased in others. The differences in life expectancy were correlated with health behaviors and local area characteristics."

The study found that since 2001 life expectancy increased 2.3 years for the wealthiest five percent of American men and by nearly three percent for similarly situated women, noted NPR. Life expectancy for the poorest five percent, though, barely increased over the same time.

In places like New York and Los Angeles, the poor lived nearly as long as their middle-class neighbors or experienced increasing life expectancy levels in the 21st century, the Times said, but the poor in Detroit and Tulsa had some of the lowest life expectancy rates among low-income people.

NPR noted that while low-income residents in Birmingham, Alabama are living about as long as the rich, in Tampa, Florida, the poor lost ground over the course of the study.

"You want to think about this problem at a more local level than you might have before," Raj Chetty, a Stanford economist who is the study’s lead author, told the Times. "You don't want to just think about why things are going badly for the poor in America. You want to think specifically about why they're going poorly in Tulsa and Detroit."

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