 The two countries, Hong Kong and Japan, have had some of the highest life expectancies in the world for many years. Recently, however, Hong Kong has surpassed Japan in terms of life expectancy, but it remains unclear if this means that Hong Kong has also surpassed Japan in terms of life disparity. To answer this question, decomposition analysis was used to examine the contribution of different age groups to the change in life expectancy and life disparity over time. The results showed that the reduction in mortality of the adult and older age groups contributed most to the increase in life expectancy for both populations. For Hong Kong, however, the reduction in premature deaths among the oldest elderly population has increased life disparity, while for Japan, the opposite effect occurred. This suggests that the increasing dominance of saving lives at later ages may be responsible for the reemergence of increasing life disparity in these two long-lived populations. This article was authored by Yan Zheng, Meng Ni Chen, and Paul SF Yip.