Gender and the socioeconomic gradient in mortality

Despite considerable evidence documenting a strong and persistent relations hip between socioeconomic position and mortality, recent research suggests that this association may be weaker among women. In our examination of gend er differences in the socioeconomic gradient in mortality, we argue that th is inconsistency arises from the failure to consider the ways in which gend er is a fundamental constituent of socioeconomic position. The data used ar e from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Respondents, including all house hold heads and their partners, aged 29 years and alder in 1972 (N = 5,665; 56% female), were followed until 1991, death, or attrition. Discrete time e vent history analysis was used to examine the predictors of death between 1 972 and 1991. Of the key socioeconomic predictors, years of education was m easured at baseline, while earned income was a time-varying covariate. We f ind no gender differences in the effect of respondents' own socioeconomic p ositions on their mortality risk. However; increasing spousal income raises men's odds of dying, while the opposite is true for women. Our results rai se questions about the prevailing view that the socioeconomic gradient in m ortality is weaker among women. Moreover; gender differences in the effects of spousal earnings on mortality risk suggest that their labor market rewa rds have fundamentally different meanings for women and men.