Income Inequality and Health Trajectories from Mid-Life to Later Life: Are Canadian and American Differences Widening?

Abstract

Abstract: It is well known that policies and welfare regimes differentially affect the aging process, health trajectories over the life course, and indeed life expectancy. Growing income inequalities are also understood to have health and well-being implications. The focus in this paper is on the effects of growing income inequalities on the health and well-being of those in mid-life as they age in two neighbouring countries, Canada and the United States. The authors rely on a comparative multi-method approach informed by a life course perspective. Placing the trajectories of synthetic cohorts in the two countries in the contexts of contrasting welfare policy regimes, the authors examine the relative effects of growing income inequalities on well-being as people move into their later years. By juxtaposing the effects of long-term policies and growing income inequalities with the life course process of aging, the authors can hypothesize what the health and well-being prospects may be for those who will soon be in their older years in the two countries.