Does the party of the president influence infant mortality? Infant mortality in the United States has dropped over the past 80 years, though it remains embarrassingly high when compared with other advanced nations. But a group of researchers has found a correlation with the president's party—
and guess what it is:
What Rodriguez and colleagues investigate is whether, relative to this broader trend, infant mortality rates are higher under Republican or Democratic presidential administrations. Drawing on data from 1965 to 2010, they find that infant mortality is, on average, 3 percent higher under Republican administrations (again, relative to the trend). This is after accounting for other factors that could also affect infant mortality, such as trends in education attainment, the unemployment rate, and economic inequality.
Now, this is just one finding and as we know, correlation does not equal causation. But it's ... interesting. Especially when you consider other, similar correlations, like how
private-sector jobs grew more under Democratic than Republican presidents between 1961 and 2012. Like I say, it's interesting.