Experts from Tulane University, the CDC, University of Oxford, University of Washington, and Syracuse University discuss what life expectancy actually measures, how these values are calculated, why the United States is falling behind other countries, and what individuals and policymakers can do to improve American life expectancy.
Any changes in life expectancy are covered extensively in the news, as was recently shown when US life expectancy hit a new high of 79 years. It is often unclear, however, why gaining or losing a year of life expectancy as a country actually matters, or what these values really say about the health of individuals. Reporting also often highlights the United States’ low life expectancy, ranking just 49th globally in 2022, well behind most other wealthy countries. Why is America’s life expectancy so poor—and what can we do to fix it?
On February 25, 2026, the National Academy of Medicine’s Health in the Headlines series brought together experts in demography, epidemiology, health equity, and public policy for a discussion, moderated by Thomas LaVeist of Tulane University, to define what life expectancy measures actually capture, highlight positive and concerning trends, and discuss what these statistics reveal about the health of our nation and the globe.
This article outlines six key takeaways from the discussion, including how life expectancy is calculated, what makes it change, what it really says about the health of a region, and what individuals and policymakers can do to improve it.
Life Expectancy Captures a Snapshot in Time for the Entire American Population—It Isn’t a Crystal Ball
The term “life expectancy” is often misinterpreted. When asked to define life expectancy as simply as possible, Bob Anderson of the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics explained that this number estimates how long a hypothetical person born today would live, assuming mortality rates stayed exactly the same as they are in are in the current year. For example, life expectancy calculated in 2020 would incorporate the mortality impacts of COVID-19 as if they persisted across the entirety of a hypothetical person’s life—hence the life expectancy decrease of almost 2 years from 2019 to 2020. Life expectancy is also an average, and the US’s comparatively lower value reflects a higher fraction of people dying before 65 than other countries, which brings down the average length of life.
Jennifer Beam Dowd of the University of Oxford emphasized that life expectancy statistics aren’t intuitive because they don’t predict the lifespan of any individual—they are a snapshot of mortality levels for the population in a given year. Ali Mokdad of the University of Washington added that life expectancy can be affected by periods of increased mortality. For example, during a war, more younger people die than during peace time, so life expectancy goes down. The life expectancy drop doesn’t mean that everyone in the country has lost years of lifespan, but it appears dramatic since it’s been so impacted by the large numbers of early deaths.
“So life expectancy in 2024 assumes that person experiences the mortality rates of that year throughout their life. Life expectancy is really an indicator of current mortality—not the future.”
-Bob Anderson
Life Expectancy as a Barometer of Population Health
The panelists emphasized that mortality risk doesn’t just come from individual actions like smoking, exercise, or eating habits; the broader social and economic context can also have a big impact. These factors can range from the minimum wage rate to whether you can buy alcohol on a Sunday. Jennifer Karas Montez of Syracuse University noted that state policies significantly impact life expectancy, providing Connecticut and Oklahoma as an example—states that had the same life expectancy in 1959 when data were first available. Connecticut has, since 1980, raised tobacco taxes, offered earned income tax credits, and raised their minimum wage, and these policy decisions can be linked with improvements in their life expectancy. Conversely, Oklahoma, over the same period, has rolled back economic protections and firearm laws, and their life expectancy has only marginally improved.
Mokdad expanded on how socioeconomic factors not directly related to health can impact life expectancy, beginning with education. Highly educated individuals are more likely to be financially stable, and are also more likely to be able to both understand and follow medical guidance. Geography also plays a role in accessing health care, as people who live in a city are likely physically closer to a hospital if they have a life-threatening event like a heart attack, compared to those who live in more rural areas and may need to travel hours to access care, increasing their chance of death in an emergency. All of these factors impact health, well-being, and mortality and thereby impact life expectancy.
Dowd noted that even financially advantaged and highly educated Americans seem to be worse off than people in other countries with less socioeconomic advantage— suggesting that it may be hard to avoid pervasive health risks in the US For example, it is difficult to fully escape the public health impacts of the American food system, and money cannot shield you from neighbors using firearms or driving dangerously. Dowd encouraged researchers to consider these broad environments when thinking about policy changes to improve life expectancy.
“Our health and longevity is driven in part by forces outside our control. For example, we are impacted by economic policies, other people’s driving, air pollution, water pollution, and more. It’s not just an individual responsibility.”
– Jennifer Karas Montez
When Life Expectancy Does Increase, It Doesn’t Rise for Everyone
Underlying much of the conversation was the acknowledgment that even though US life expectancy is rising—albeit slowly—many populations are being left behind. Disparities exist across nearly every population type, including race, sex, geographic location, and level of education. Montez explained that people without a four-year college degree—over 60 percent of the US population—have seen their life expectancy decline rather than rise. Mokdad noted a study he and his colleagues conducted on Seattle’s King County, where they found up to 18 years difference in life expectancy among individuals who live less than 30 miles away from one another. Anderson shared that historically, Asian American and Hispanic American populations have higher life expectancy than African American and Native American/Alaska Native populations, although these disparities were significantly impacted by COVID-19. Furthermore, men generally have 5 to 6 years lower life expectancy than women. These disparities persist across time and, the panelists emphasized, are areas of critical concern that overall gains in life expectancy obscure.
“Our average is improving, but not all of us are improving at the same rate.”
– Ali Mokdad
The US is Doing Poorly—And Things May Be Getting Worse
The new US life expectancy record of 79 years, although much lauded, actually barely surpassed the US measure of 78.8 years in 2019. This new high also comes after nearly a decade of no improvements, as life expectancy in 2010 was 78.7 years. Such incremental improvements stand in stark contrast to peer countries like Denmark, who have raised their life expectancy 3 years between 2010 and 2023 (79 to 81 years) and Japan, who raised theirs a full year over the same time period. Furthermore, this record US life expectancy is still lower than almost all peer nations—so it may not be time to celebrate yet.
US life expectancy has been diverging from peer countries since 1980. The opioid epidemic has played a major role in US stagnation, but so have increases in major causes of death, including cardiovascular disease. Significant reductions in deaths due to cardiovascular disease boosted American life expectancy for decades, but in 2010, these deaths stopped declining so quickly. The slight increase in these deaths plus the addition of deaths due to the opioid epidemic have contributed to our stagnating life expectancy. Complicating the picture even further is the US’s high rate of mortality among young people, attributable to increased deaths by motor vehicle crashes, firearms, and substance use.
“The picture is really that the US is treading water while other countries are sprinting ahead.”
– Jennifer Beam Dowd
Dowd noted that there is hope, because other countries are still increasing their life expectancy. Since other nations are improving, there is no biological limit that is hindering America’s improvement, and if we can surpass the current human and social constraints standing in our way, improving US life expectancy is possible.
Life Expectancy Cannot Be Addressed with a Single Policy. Thankfully, There Are Many Ways to Help.
Since life expectancy is impacted by so many aspects of everyday life, no single policy will be able to reverse the trajectory. Montez noted that since state policies impact a broad swath of everyday life, including economic well-being (minimum wage laws and property taxes), behaviors (alcohol and firearm laws and cigarette taxes), access to health care (insurance policies and other programs), and family structure (abortion laws and paid and family leave), they can likely move the needle on US life expectancy. Specifically, policies related to work may make the biggest impact, as having a stable job has cascading positive effects like being able to afford a home and pay for health care, reducing stress, and perhaps even reducing unhealthy coping mechanisms—all of which directly or indirectly impact individual health.
“There is no single policy that will get us out of this. The best-case scenario is that we take a full approach and try and address everything from structural issues, like state policies, all the way down to individual behaviors.”
– Jennifer Karas Montez
Dowd added that communicating the loss of a year or more in life expectancy in terms of actual people and lives is critical to ensuring continued focus on this issue. A recent paper explained that if America’s life expectancy matched that of 21 other peer nations in 2020 and 2021, 2.1 million lives would have been saved. Dowd noted that metrics like these make vague statistics more real and could be valuable in explaining the importance of these values to people and policymakers.
What Can Individuals and Policymakers Do?
The panelists agreed that the greatest impact individuals can have on life expectancy is to adopt healthy behaviors in their own lives, including quitting smoking, maintaining a healthy weight, and fostering robust relationships with friends and family. For policymakers, the panelists encouraged the pursuit of policies to support K-12 education, healthy and affordable food, and well-paying jobs, as these investments would have cascading positive effects for health and mortality.
“I want to encourage people to recognize that we are all in this together and to think about what you can do at your local level to motivate some of these changes that we feel will have long-term benefits.”
– Jennifer Beam Dowd
Watch a recording of the full discussion about life expectancy below.
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Disclaimer: Statements, recommendations, and opinions expressed in the webinar and this document are those of individual presenters and participants. These views are not necessarily endorsed or verified by the National Academy of Medicine or the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and should not be construed as reflecting any group consensus.
