From the Cradle to the Grave? Welfare Regimes and the Quantity of Life: Global Trends and Cross-National Evidence

Abstract

Can welfare institutions affect the quantity of human life? While the question may seem grandiose, years of welfare state retrenchment and the COVID-19 pandemic have refocused attention on government intervention in people’s lives. Scholars have long been concerned with the impact of the welfare state on different outcomes, primarily economic and social. More recent focus has shifted to the impact of welfare policy on human well-being. Still, this literature suffers from at least two drawbacks: an overriding focus on high-income countries and emphasis on subjective well-being. In this article, we try to address these drawbacks by examining multiple dimensions of human longevity, including life expectancy, life expectancy inequality, maternal mortality, and healthy life years, using a panel dataset covering countries at varying levels of development over multiple decades. We begin by documenting global trends in these outcomes and in welfare regimes over time (1990–2023). We then assess the relationship between welfare institutions and longevity indicators using pooled panel models and specifications with two-way fixed effects (2006–2022). Finally, we discuss some illustrative cases. Our findings indicate that more generous welfare regimes are associated with higher levels in the quantity of life overall. Implications for the study of the relationship between the welfare state and well-being are discussed.