"The Long-Run Growth in Obesity as a Function of Technological
Change"
BY: RICHARD A. POSNER
University of Chicago Law School
TOMAS PHILIPSON
University of Chicago
Document: Available from the SSRN Electronic Paper Collection:
http://papers.ssrn.com/paper.taf?abstract_id=167008
Other Electronic Document Delivery:
http://www.law.uchicago.edu/Publications/Working/
Paper ID: University of Chicago Law School, John M. Olin Law &
Economics Working Paper No. 78
Date: May 1999
Contact: RICHARD A. POSNER
Email: Mailto:paul_choi at law.uchicago.edu
Postal: University of Chicago Law School
LBQ 611
1111 East 60th Street
Chicago, IL 60637 USA
Phone: (773)702-9608
Fax: (773)702-0730
Co-Auth: TOMAS PHILIPSON
Email: Mailto:t-philipson at uchicago.edu
Postal: University of Chicago
1126 East 59th Street
Chicago, IL 60637 USA
ABSTRACT:
This paper analyzes the forces contributing to the worldwide
long-run rise in obesity and the role of public interventions in
affecting its continued growth. A growth in obesity in a
population must result from the growth of calorie consumption
outpacing the growth of physical activity. Yet in developed
countries, obesity has grown with modest rises in calorie
consumption and with a substantial increase in both exercise and
dieting. We consider the economic incentives that give rise to a
growth in obesity by stimulating intake of calories at the same
time as discouraging the expending of calories on physical
activity. We argue that technological change provides a natural
interpretation of the long-run growth in obesity, that it
predicts that the effect of income on obesity changes sign with
economic development, and that it implies that the growth in
obesity may be self-limiting.
JEL Classification: I11, I12