The ranks of death: secular trends in income and mortality*

This paper is about the reasons why there is so rarely a strong association between the secular trend in real wages and mortality. We classify the reasons in several different categories: epidemiological, sociological, geographical, demographic, technologic, and economic. In addition, we offer some speculations on why there has been an expectation that such an association would exist. We suggest that this expectation is found primarily in British work (including Britain overseas) and has to do with the history of the British experience of industrial and economic growth and its pervasive interpretations.