I’m not fat! Just big boned!
Go figure, fat people cost more to the bottom line
Overweight workers cost their bosses more in injury claims than their lean colleagues, suggests a study that found the heaviest employees had twice the rate of workers’ compensation claims as their fit co-workers.
Like Jason’s last post, I haven’t given this much thought, but I can tell you that obesity is a serious problem in this country and with a broken health care system someone is going to take the burden of all those citizens that continue to make unhealthy choices.
Duke University researchers also found that the fattest workers had 13 times more lost workdays due to work-related injuries, and their medical claims for those injuries were seven times higher than their fit co-workers.
Overweight workers were more likely to have claims involving injuries to the back, wrist, arm, neck, shoulder, hip, knee and foot than other employees.
It falls on the individual to keep themselves healthy of course, that being said though I don’t see the government subsidizing fruits and vegetables like they do other products. With the way they treat global warming and the way corporations dictate government policy I just don’t understand whatsover why on earth diabetes and child hood obesity are skyrocketing….
The alarming increase is obesity isn’t just due to the decline in healthy habits. Over at TommyWonk, I highlighted a story on how farm policy subsidizes the production of fattening foods. Check it out and start arguing.
Go to any workplace in Delaware and try to find some healthy food within a half-hour (lunchbreak) radius.
OK, pack your lunch every morning, but don’t be late!
Of course, your boss isn’t fat, because he has as much time as he needs to go get some decent food. And he can work out when he gets home because somebody else is watching his kids.
I think you might be that there is a bit of class issue at work here but I don’t think healthy food is hard to get. I just think it is under marketed.
If the money spent on advertising Big Macs and snickers bars was spent on selling apples and pears we’d see a big change overnight.
money spent on advertising Big Macs and snickers bars
Television is heavily marketed too, yet I don’t watch it at work. Why not?
Employers spend lots of money on attorney retainers to fire sick and injured workers. If they spent some of that money instead on making subsidized healthy lunches available, everybody would be a lot healthier.
In an existing corporate cafeteria, the cheesesteaks should be ten dollars and the salad should be fifty cents. And the soda fountain and candy/chip machines should be hauled away to the landfill.
not sure which anon to reply to, but I will say that I think it is somewhat of a class issue. Go to any supermarket and take a look at which is more expensive the junk food or the fruits and vegies?
I don’t know if it is just advertising anon, I think it has more to do with Profit. You can advertise all you want a kid to eat an apple, but when the margin on a Snickers bar is 60% v 15% on an apple it is a no brainer.
FAT, what an ugly word. Did you ever wonder why people are fat? Do you believe the “FAT” people enjoy being fat? I disagree with Duke’s study, are they not located in the land where lard is a staple in people’s home? I am about 30 lbs overweight, not by choice. I excersise, eat healthly, never eat fast food, but at 53 I just can’t seem to rid the mid section. One thing I do know is I can out run, lift more weight, and out work most 25 yr olds. Research like this, research that is contained to one company, one local is unfair and here we go again. Discrimation! If you are over the age of 50, female, now over weight. Whats next?
Betty,
thanks for commenting first off.
Do you believe the “FAT” people enjoy being fat?
No, but I think it is easier to eat and hide behind that wall, then it is to work out. There becomes a point of no return in people’s minds and at some point though they may not “enjoy” being fat, they don’t care anymore
“I disagree with Duke’s study, are they not located in the land where lard is a staple in people’s home?”
you can disagree with Duke all you want, but when ever you see a study about obesity and it comes from Duke you should respect the study. They are the country’s leader when it comes this type of research. This isn’t the first study they have done on obesity, it is just a new angle. 11,000 people is not a small population to sample.
I can see I touched a nerve with my title, that was just to grab some attention.
I work out about 6 times a week and run about 20 miles a week. I understand what it is like to be overweight and can sympathize with you.
I will give you one piece of advice and I gaurantee you will lose weight after 1 months.
Write down EVERYTHING you eat each day for a week. Go to a calorie counting website and total the calories. (include everything! including, soda, juice, a single jelly bean)
Then go find what your daily caloric intake should be and start looking to where you can cut back.
A woman your age only needs so many calories a day.
If you already knew all of this, I apologize, if not give it a try.
thanks for commenting!
I’m a little disgusted at this “someone else made me fat” cry. The ‘double-chicken’ package at Sams Club gives you two chickens at a per-capita (per chicken) cost of less than one big mack. Broil it, fry it, fricasse it, whatever, its healthier and less fattening and cheaper than fast food. Put a cold piece in a baggy for lunch at work.
dis,
you can be disgusted all you want, but it doesn’t just come down to choice, which is what tommy is alluding to as well.
It comes down to economics as well as education.
A lb of chicken breast is going for about $3.49, a lb of pasta about $1.
You tell me what someone is going to choose if they only have $50 a week to spend on groceries?
Sam’s club is a membership place, you tell me if someone on the other end of the economic scale is going to shell out $50 a year to save $.50 per pound of chicken.
I did say that I believe it is a personal choice, but the facts don’t lie, it comes down to an economic choice for many and there in lies the disastrous cycle
Sedentary jobs are an occupational hazard and employers bear some responsibility for providing access to healthy foods and exercise opportunities, just like the prison system is responsible for the health of the inmates. Try telling your boss you’ll be right back after your run. And then try finding a shower.
If you have a 100% sedentary job and are already overweight, it is impossible to eat few enough calories to lose weight.
You could work out when you get home, if you are lucky enough to have child care. Otherwise you just start making dinner and helping with the homework and baths, and forget about working out.
I agree with everyone that the lower end of the economic scale faces fewer and fewer choices. But their are still choices. One pound of flour, .65 pounds of water, and a teaspoon of yeast makes great, healthy bread. Pasta is an egg and some flour and a rolling pin.
You don’t have to buy the mac at $3.
One pound of flour, .65 pounds of water, and a teaspoon of yeast makes great, healthy bread.
If you say so.
Donviti, can I come eat at your house instead?
anon1; you freeking gourmand! I speet on your shoes!
anon1,
bring a bottle of wine and you are in my good graces, bring two and I will be in your debt
wait, did I just lobby you?
keep the wine under $100 bucks please, and when you fly in, fly with a corporate CEO that just happens to be heading to the same area
Wait, dammit! You didn’t say he was brining bottles of Opus! If he doesn’t like the master recipe for baugette I gave above, I’ll make him a cheese burger in return for a good red.
‘Employers need to be careful not to view this study as a green light to treat obese or overweight workers differently,’ Corenthal said.
That green light has been green for a long, long time. To suggest that weight prejudice in the workplace does not exist, suggests how out of touch some can be.
This study does not advance the plight of the obese. What is does do, however, is make the obese person the scapegoat for high health insurance rates. Employers and employees who complain about the rising costs, now can point the finger at their overweight colleagues.
Fat people know they are fat. And just to be sure, society reminds them of that every day. They are the last safe object of ridicule. If this article had been written about race or gender, it would never have seen the light of day.
To release this study without discussion of the overall causes of obesity is highly careless. Overweight people, who already contend with prejudice when it comes to hiring, now will have an additional burden.
Duke University, which ought to know something about the public’s rush to judgment, has done great potential harm to those who will now be more likely to find themselves on the receiving end of prejuducial hiring practices.
Brent,
your point is well taken, I ask you this however, what is the difference between an overweight person and someone who smokes?
I don’t think the public can rush to judgement on this one. Didn’t the study layout where obese workers are more costly? They studied quiet a lot of people.
You may fell the burden society places on obese people is unfair but, study after study is proving the cost on health care and productivity. You can’t ignore it.
If anything maybe this study will be a wake up call to employers (as other have mentioned here) to promote wellness.
Well, Donviti, history is replete with examples of certain abuse towards individuals.
There was a time in our history when people enjoyed minstrel shows. Some people found humor in the mentally ill. And a certain maniac once tried to develop the “master race.”
Just suppose that research finds that obesity is part of one’s DNA. Anyone can dye their skin ( for example in the novel “Black Like Me”) but that outward appearance does not change that person’s DNA.
Similarly, a person genetically disposed to be heavy may lose weight…but that does not change the DNA.
Science has determined that certain ethnic groups are more prone to diseases than other ethnic groups. Should we consider charging them more for health insurance?
It really boils down to two schools of thought: Either obesity has a genetic source or obese people are inconsiderate slobs who refuse to take care of themselves and thus are a drain on our health care.
I believe in the former; the other is simply one of society’s pervasive stereotypes.
Brent,
First off, the first rule of debating is don’t invoke the Hitler arguement.
that being said….
you wont get an arguement from me that SOME people are predisposed to obesity. However, you can NOT tell me that the alarming increase in childhood type 2 (i believe) diabetes and the increase in childhood obesity is because Americans have some DNA that everyone else in the world does not.
Your arguements for societies previous perversions does not address obesity. People don’t choose to be Mentally ill, and they sure don’t choose to have their period. As for your hitler comment…no comment needed.
The fact is that our society has become obese and it is not because as a race we all of a sudden have some magical gene that predisposes us to obesity.
No offense but it sounds to me like you WANT to believe that fat people are fat because, sigh, of “thyroid” problem…or are “big boned”. Perhaps you are overweight yourself and struggle with it daily. Maybe you DO suffer from something that is hereditary I don’t know, but I do know your arguement isn’t valid, unfortunately.
look man, there is no way that there aren’t people that aren’t fat, but we have a serious problem in this country. You can’t tell me that all these children (record numbers) have a PREVENTABLE form of diabetes because of their DNA.
Theren’t a bunch of overweight people in my breakroom chowing down on 2 pints of chinese food, slurping down a diet soda and complaining they are full because of their DNA.