Study Finds Men Emit More Pollution Thanks to These Two Lifestyle Choices

We already know about the gender gap in things like wages and retail prices (hello, pink tax), but did you know that there's a gender gap when it comes to pollution as well? According to French researchers, there is a very noticeable difference in the amount of pollution produced between the two sexes, and it would appear that men are guilty of creating far more of it than women are.

What's behind this? According to the research, men emit more pollution thanks to certain lifestyle choices.

Keep reading to find out just how much more pollution men emit than women, and what causes such a vast difference.

French researchers took a look at the pollution produced by 15,000 different people in France to determine which sex was guilty of producing the most waste. According to their findings, which were published in the journal The London School of Economics and Political Science in 2025, men create 26 percent more of the pollution that heats up the planet and drives climate change than women do.

Researchers say that mainly has to do with certain lifestyle factors, like men's red meat consumption and the cars they drive. Both of these factors account for between 6.5 and 9.5 percent of the difference.

However, researchers note that when adjusted for socioeconomic factors, that difference drops down to 18 percent. That has a lot to do with the excess money these men have to spend on those pollution producing items.

“Our results suggest that traditional gender norms, particularly those linking masculinity with red meat consumption and car use, play a significant role in shaping individual carbon footprints,” Ondine Berland, the co-author of the study, told The Guardian.

It's not just one study making these claims either. In a 2021 Swedish study, men were discovered to emit 16 percent more emissions due to their shopping habits.

When it comes to where the most pollution is coming from, it looks like China is the clear winner. According to the WorldOMeter website, China produced 12,667,428,430 tons of CO2 emissions in 2022, and that adds up to 32.88 percent of the world's share of emissions.

The U.S. ranks second with 4,853,780,240 tons of emissions, which accounts for 12.60 percent of the world's share.

While it appears that different genders, and even different countries, can change how much pollution a person emits, it's clear that we need to work together to find a way to reduce the amount of CO2 humans of all walks of life generate.

That's because these emissions directly influence the rate at which the planet is heating up, producing more extreme weather patterns and events around the globe.

And unfortunately for those working to limit the amount of pollution they produce individually, global warming doesn't discriminate, and it will eventually impact all of us in one way or another.