Poverty report links wealth to life expectancy

Poorer Americans are much less likely to survive into their 70s and 80s than rich Americans, a stark lifeexpectancy divide compounded by the nation's growing disparities in wealth, according to a U.S. report. Over three-quarters of the richest 50-somethings in 1991 were still alive 23 years later, in 2014, the report found. But among the poorest 20 per cent of that cohort, the survival rate was less than 50 per cent, according to the analysis by the Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan congressional research agency. The report finds that while average life expectancy increased over that period, it "has not increased uniformly across all income groups, and people who have lower incomes tend to have shorter lives than those with higher incomes."