Adjusting for conventional risk factors, compared with the high education group (reference), the hazard ratios (95 % confidence interval) for incident hypertension across the education categories were 1.54 (1.16-2.06) and 1.80 (1.36-2.38) in women and 1.15 (0.92-1.43), and 1.08 (0.84-1.38) in men. Women with the low household income were more likely to have hypertension than those with the high household income and incident hypertension had an inverse association with household income level in women: multivariate adjusted hazard ratios were 1.00 (reference), 1.10 (0.83-1.45), and 1.63 (0.75-2.16). Men with medium income were less likely to have hypertension compared with those with high income (0.76, 0.61-0.90).