The Gender Gap in Demographic Losses during the Coronavirus Pandemic: Why the Female Life Expectancy Losses Are More than the Male Ones in Russia

Abstract

Russia is practically the only country with reliable statistics in which life expectancy at birth during the coronavirus pandemic in 2020–2021 fell more for women than for men. Based on regional data and using an OLS model, the authors discuss the relationship between women’s demographic loss during the pandemic years in the regions of Russia and demographic and social determinants — factors associated with gender equality (in the labor market in wages and employment), with occupational segregation (work in medical organizations in the positions of medical staff at various levels), the demographic development of the region (success in increasing life expectancy for men and women in recent years), digitalization indicators (the share of people using electronic government services, the share of people using the Internet to buy goods). The result of the study is that higher compared to male female supermortality in the regions of Russia is associated with the presence of gender inequality, which, however, requires additional study, since this relationship with gender inequality is not recorded in other countries. The digitalization factor (use of digital public services) showed a non-significant relationship. The modernization factor (participation in online trading) is counter-intuitive — modernization contributes to excess mortality. The demographic factor showed significance only for men — perhaps this is due to the higher mortality of the male part of the population. The result we obtained only partially answers the question why in Russia LE0 of women fell during the pandemic much more than LE0 of men — in other countries, apparently, they were compensated by the targeted state social policy or the strict enforcement of the introduced restrictive rules, which requires additional research.