Dr. Jennifer Karas Montez, Syracuse University, Professor, Sociology
Title: Electoral Democracy and Working-age Deaths in the United States
Abstract: In recent decades, death rates among working-age adults in the United States have been high, rising, and increasingly unequal across states. The magnitude of the inequalities is striking—death rates in some states are more than twice as large as death rates in others. A growing body of evidence points to decades-long changes in U.S. states’ policy contexts as a partial explanation. This talk will share findings from a recent study examining democratic erosion as a potential explanation. The erosion has been pronounced in some states, resulting from efforts such as gerrymandering that create barriers to free and fair elections. The talk will illustrate the democratic erosion across states, show how the erosion predicts increases in working-age death rates, and provide insights into why erosion may affect deaths.
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