|
 The study examined county-level data on voting patterns from the
2008 and 2016 presidential elections and on life expectancy for
people born from 1980 to 2014.
Nationally, life expectancy increased by an average 5.3 years during
the study period, researchers report in the American Journal of
Public Health, online August 17.
In counties with below-average gains in life expectancy or declines,
a majority of voters chose Trump, the Republican nominee. But in
counties with above-average gains in life expectancy, most voters
chose the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.
“Although economic marginalization has been cited as a reason for
shifting voting patterns, the relationship between changes in life
expectancy and the 2016 election results had not been previously
documented,” said study author Jacob Bor of the Boston University
School of Public Health.
“The very strong association is striking and suggests that the large
divergence in health fortunes has mirrored the divergence in
politics,” Bor said by email.
To assess the connection between survival odds and political
participation, Bor looked at changes in the Republican share of
votes between 2008 and 2016 as well as shifts in the absolute
numbers of votes won by each of the two major political parties.
Overall, Republicans lost 67,000 votes from 2008 to 2016 in counties
with above-average gains in life expectancy but gained 3.1 million
votes in counties with below-average life expectancy trends.
During the same period, Democrats gained 1.4 million votes in
counties with above-average life expectancy gains but lost 5 million
votes in counties with below-average gains.
Counties where life expectancy stagnated or declined saw a
10-percentage-point increase in the Republican vote share between
2008 and 2016, the study found.
In counties where life expectancy increased by less than 3 years
over the study period, the Republican vote share increased on
average by 9.1 percentage points.
For each additional year of life expectancy gain, the change in
Republican vote share was 2.3 percentage points lower.
Democrats, meanwhile, saw an average 3.5-percentage-point increase
in vote share in counties where life expectancy gains exceeded 7
years.
[to top of second column] |
The study wasn’t a controlled experiment designed to prove whether
or how life expectancy might directly influence voting.
But Bor notes that since coming to power, the Trump administration
has proposed cuts to health insurance for the poor, social programs,
health research, and environmental worker protections that are all
are key determinants of health at the population level and might
influence life expectancy in the future.
“This study confirms what we already know,” said Dr. Vicente
Navarro, a health policy researcher at the Bloomberg School of
Public Health at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. “The
standard of living and quality of life of the majority of the
working class of the U.S. has been declining.”
“They are angry and channel their anger against what they consider
the political establishment, voting for Trump,” Navarro, who wasn’t
involved in the study, said by email. “The paradox is that President
Trump is carrying out policies that will further reduce their life
expectancy.”
Even though the study doesn’t prove life expectancy influences
voting decisions, many health problems that can contribute to a
premature death can also fuel voter dissatisfaction with the status
quo, said Jose Tapia, a politics researcher at Drexel University in
Philadelphia who wasn’t involved in the study.
“Higher mortality rates can be caused for instance by more frequent
deaths due to diabetes, overdose of prescription or illegal drugs,
alcohol abuse, suicide or heart attacks, all of which can be
correlated with higher rates of dissatisfaction with standards of
life or current politic, which can lead to vote against the party in
power,” Tapia said by email.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/2xpLmHl
Am J Public Health 2017.
[© 2017 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2017 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. |
