Has it Always Paid to be Rich? Income and Cause-Specific Mortality in Southern Sweden 1905-2014"

Socioeconomic differences in mortality are among the most pervasive facts of contemporary societies. While the mortality gradient by income is well-established for the period after 1970, knowledge about the origins of the gradient is still rudimentary. We analyze the association between income and cause-specific adult mortality during the period 1905-2014 in an area of southern Sweden using competing-risk hazard models with individual-level longitudinal data for over 2.2 million person-years and over 35,000 deaths. The present-day income gradient in adult mortality emerged only in the post-WWII period and did so for the leading causes of death largely simultaneously.