Encyclopedia of Sociology

BIRTH AND DEATH RATES

1950-55 1955-60 1960-65 1965-70 1970-75 1975-80 1980-85 1985-90 1990-95

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

80

85

Years of age

United States

Mexico

Japan

Zimbabwe

Indonesia

China

64

67

69 70

71

73

76

74

77

75

78

71

76

68.5

63

51

70

67

60

56

68

66.6

56

56

65

(^6365)
63
54
53
49
51
49
46
42
40
37
41
41
51
55
58
44
46
45
49
59.6
60
80
73
71
69 70 70
Figure 3. Life Expectancy at Birth: Selected Countries, 1950–1995.
SOURCE:United Nations, World Population Prospects, 1996.
Note that cause-specific death rates are calculated
per 100,000 population in a specified group, rath-
er than per 1,000 to avoid working with decimals.
Age-specific mortality rates usually are specif-
ic for sex and race or ethnicity because of the large
differences evident in Table 1. Using five-year age
categories results in thirty-eight rates for each
racial or ethnic group. Analyses of such data can
be unwieldy. When the age pattern of mortality is
not of interest, an age-adjusted composite meas-
ure is preferable. The most readily available of
these for international comparisons is life expectancy.
Life expectancy is the average number of years
that members of an age group would live if they
were to experience the age-specific death rates
prevailing in a given year. It is calculated for each
age group in a life table (Shryock and Siegel 1976,
pp. 249–268). Life expectancy has increased since
the nineteenth century in developed countries like
the United States in tandem with economic growth
and public health reforms. Japan has the longest
life expectancy at birth, eighty years, due to ex-
tremely low infant mortality. With the exception
of Russia and some of the other former Soviet-bloc
countries of Eastern Europe that have had de-
clines in life expectancy, all other developed coun-
tries have life expectancies at birth that equal or
exceed seventy years (Population Reference Bu-
reau 1998).
Figure 3 presents trends in life expectancy
since World War II in selected countries. Some of
the most rapid increases have been in Asia and
Latin America. China, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Mexi-
co, and Venezuela, for example, have 1998 life
expectancies at birth of over seventy years. In-
creases in life expectancy in African countries, in
contrast, where there is a relatively high preva-
lence of poor nutrition, unsanitary conditions,
and infectious diseases, generally have lagged be-
hind Asia and Latin America. Most have 1998 life
expectancies in the forties or fifties, similar to
those of developed countries at the end of the
nineteenth century. The future trend in life ex-
pectancy in many African countries is uncertain.