Potential Years of Life Lost and Its Implication on Economic Output: Assessment of OECD Members and Candidate Countries for the Period 1993-2018

Over the last 30 years, significant geopolitical, social, and economic changes have impacted the OECD members and candidates, which has led to a significant improvement in the quality of life and life expectancy, with the reduction of the potential years of life lost one of the indicators of reduced mortality observed across the group. On the geopolitical side, the admission of the Baltic countries and their standardization of the metrics to track demographics more aligned with the internationally accepted practices, on the social side; the increase in life expectancy poses challenges to the care of the elders but also the extension on the age within the labor force and lastly, on the economic changes; the ongoing increase of income and GDP has led to an expanded access of care including goods and services. This paper explores the use of mortality information and potential years of life lost as a beacon to point toward the economic burden of poor health and its related mortality.