Well Blog: By TARA PARKER-POPE
As workers moved from farms and factories to desks, calories have been piling up, a new study has found.
Less Active at Work, Workplace Cited as a New Source of Rise in Obesity
Looking beyond poor eating habits and a couch-potato lifestyle, a group of researchers has found a new culprit in the obesity epidemic: the American workplace. A sweeping review of shifts in the labor force since 1960 suggests that a sizable portion of the national weight gain can be explained by declining physical activity during the workday. Jobs requiring moderate physical activity, which accounted for 50 percent of the labor market in 1960, have plummeted to just 20 percent.
The remaining 80 percent of jobs, the researchers report, are sedentary or require only light activity. The shift translates to an average decline of about 120 to 140 calories a day in physical activity, closely matching the nation’s steady weight gain over the past five decades, according to the report, published Wednesday in the journal PLoS One. Today, an estimated one in three Americans are obese. Researchers caution that workplace physical activity most likely accounts for only one piece of the obesity puzzle, and that diet, lifestyle and genetics all play an important role. ...
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/25/l...
The remaining 80 percent of jobs, the researchers report, are sedentary or require only light activity. The shift translates to an average decline of about 120 to 140 calories a day in physical activity, closely matching the nation’s steady weight gain over the past five decades, according to the report, published Wednesday in the journal PLoS One. Today, an estimated one in three Americans are obese. Researchers caution that workplace physical activity most likely accounts for only one piece of the obesity puzzle, and that diet, lifestyle and genetics all play an important role. ...
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/25/l...
"Fat chance: Obesity in the workplace"
The more people weigh, the less they're worth at work. Workers who are heavier are paid an average of $1.25 less per hour, and overweight women make about 24 percent less than their thinner counterparts. But overweight employees also cost their companies more. The Conference Board says that obese employees cost companies about $45 billion annually because of higher health care premiums and absenteeism...
http://www.allbusiness.com/legal/trial-pro...