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Consequences of Obesity

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The Effects of Farm and Food Policy on Obesity in the United States

Abstract

Obesity has serious consequences both for individuals and for society as a whole. At the individual level, obesity is associated with a host of diseases resulting in reduced life expectancy, lower productivity and wages, and increased health-care expenditure. Obesity also entails significant private expenditures on preventative measures such as gymnasium memberships and weight-loss programs. At the level of the broader society, the individual consequences are reflected in social costs through lost productivity, reduced income tax receipts for the government, greater public health-care expenditure, and expenditure on public policies for reducing obesity. In this chapter, we describe and document the individual consequences and present and interpret measures of the social costs.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    These findings were broadly consistent with two previous meta-analyses that used standard categories (i.e., McGee 2005; Janssen and Mark 2007). Flegal et al. (2013) excluded studies that used nonstandard BMI categories, or were limited to adolescents, to those with specific conditions, or to those undergoing specific procedures. A more recent meta-analysis by The Global BMI Mortality Collaboration (2016) found similar patterns of association between BMI and all-cause mortality.

  2. 2.

    Other studies have found a highly nonlinear relationship between BMI and the health-care costs attributable to obesity (e.g., MacEwan et al. 2014).

  3. 3.

    Excess body fat appears to be protective against a few conditions like premenopausal breast cancer and hip fracture (Willet et al. 1999).

  4. 4.

    The BMI of a biological child would be a valid instrument for adult BMI only if shared household characteristics do not affect medical care expenditures of adults. This is unlikely to be the case in that household members typically share most food choices and some choices regarding physical activity, which are highly likely to be correlated with medical care expenditures.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, University of California, Davis, California, USA

    Julian M. Alston

  2. Food Economics Division, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, Washington, District of Columbia, USA

    Abigail M. Okrent

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  1. Julian M. Alston
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Alston, J.M., Okrent, A.M. (2017). Consequences of Obesity. In: The Effects of Farm and Food Policy on Obesity in the United States. Palgrave Studies in Agricultural Economics and Food Policy. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-47831-3_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-47831-3_3

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