Life expectancy and life expectancy lost: (dis-)similarities across Germany's regions over time

Eva Kibele, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

We want to explore patterns of life expectancy and life expectancy lost in German regions over time. Therefore we use data on population and deaths by causes for the German federal states in the time period from 1980-2006. We apply the measure e dagger, which is based on the life table and indicates the average life expectancy lost due to death. As expected, we find that increasing life expectancy is accompanied by declining life expectancy losses over time. In the cross-section however, there are deviations from this general relationship. The city states of Hamburg and Bremen, for example, have higher life expectancy losses than could be expected given their levels of life expectancy. The findings suggest that, although convergence in life expectancy lost over time across the federal states took place, there is still space for improvement in certain parts of the country.