Economic Survey 2022: Women Expected To Outlive Men In India

According to the survey, the life expectancy at birth that was 69.4 years for the period 2014-18, has also increased by 0.4 years from 2013-17.

New Delhi: Indian women are expected to outlive men by a couple of years, according to the Economic Survey 2021-22 tabled by Union Minister for Finance and Corporate Affairs, Nirmala Sitharaman in Parliament on Monday.

As per the survey, the report on ‘Sample Registration based System (SRS) based ‘Abridged Life Tables 2014-18’ provides estimates of average longevity at various age groups and estimates of expectation of life at birth for India are available for 2014-18.The survey said as per the estimate, females are expected to live longer (70.7 years) compared to males (68.2 years), it said, adding that females are expected to live longer in most States/UTs both across the rural and urban areas, except for Bihar and Jharkhand.

Moreover, the life expectancy at birth that was 69.4 years for the period 2014-18, has increased by 0.4 years from 2013-17. “It varies widely across states, ranging from the lowest of 65.2 years in Chhattisgarh to the highest at 75.3 years in Kerala and Delhi.It is higher in urban areas (72.6 years) than in rural areas (68.0 years),” said the survey.

The gap between the rural and urban life expectancy has also narrowed down significantly from 1970-75to 2014-18, the survey said. Life expectancy increase from 2013-17 is higher for rural (of 0.3 years) than the increase in urban areas (0.2 years).Given the increasing life expectancy in the country, the question that pops up is the rationale for the life insurers to increase their premium rates.