The Rise and Fall of African-American Mortality: Impacts of Cause of Death on Life Expectancy

Ward Kingkade, U.S. Census Bureau

During the 1980s life expectancy at birth fell in the Black population of the United States. Since the 1990s it has recovered. Life expectancy at birth is currently rising at a rapid pace in the Black population. These trends have been more pronounced among men than women. The proposed study investigates the proximate determinants of these phenomena as reflected by cause of death for the period 1980-2004. The proposed analysis shall assess impacts on life expectancy by the component methodology of decomposing differences in life expectancy into the contributions of various age categories and causes of death developed by Arriaga (1985). A valuable feature of this methodology is that person-years lived in a given age interval can be distinguished. Because Black mortality data at late age are often suspect an analysis of person years lived in the working ages (20-60) and from birth to age 60 will be offered.