America has a weight problem, and that weight problem is turning into an insurance problem.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 65 percent of U.S. adults — or about 129.6 million people — are either overweight or obese.

A Duke University Medical Center analysis found a direct link between obesity and the cost of workers compensation insurance. According the study, obese workers:

Truls Ostbye, MD, PhD., professor of community and family medicine summarized the problem this way:

“Given the strong link between obesity and workers’ compensation costs, maintaining healthy weight is not only important to workers but should also be a high priority for employers. Work-based programs designed to target healthful eating and physical activity should be developed and then evaluated as part of a strategy to make all workplaces healthier and safer.”

Duke researchers looked at the relationship between body mass index (BMI) and the rate of workers’ compensation claims. Because the BMI takes into account both a person’s height and weight, it is considered the most accurate measure of obesity. For Americans, a BMI of 18.5 to 24.9 is considered normal; 25 to 29.9 is considered overweight, and 30 and above is considered obese. To calculate your BMI, click here.

According the Duke study, workers with a BMI greater than 40 had 11.65 claims per 100 workers, compared with 5.8 claims per 100 in workers within the recommended range. In terms of average lost days of work, the obese averaged 183.63 per 100 employees, compared with 14.19 per 100 for those in the recommended range. The average medical claims costs per 100 employees were $51,019 for the obese and $7,503 for the non-obese.

Those are unbelievable differences. And those differences are going to lead to another “problem.”

If obesity costs more, employers are going to do what they can to reduce the number of obese workers. For many, that may mean employer-sponsored exercise programs, gym memberships, etc. Other employers may institute incentives for employees who maintain a healthy weight. Still others may decide to fire obsese workers.

Who thinks there’s anything wrong with firing an employee because he or she is obese?

According to the Council on Size and Weight Discrimination (CSWD), this is a real problem:

In our culture, people who are larger than average encounter discriminatory attitudes and are denied equal opportunity in many areas of their lives:

–Prospective employers often refuse to hire large size people, especially in jobs where employees do physical work, or jobs where employees interact with the public.

–Large people are subject to harassment about their weight by their employers, are kept in jobs beneath their abilities, and are often demoted or fired because of stated or unstated weight prejudice.

–Physicians and other health care professionals often tell fat patients to lose weight rather than treating them for their specific medical condition.

–Health care facilities and equipment (such as cat scans and MRIs) are often inaccessible to large people.

–Large people are systematically denied health insurance and life insurance, or they are forced to pay higher premiums than those of average weight.

–Applicants are often turned down by colleges, universities, and other educational institutions because of their weight.

–Landlords, housing agencies, and real estate agents often deny larger people apartments, or show them only inferior locations, to prevent them from moving into the neighborhood.

While this may sound like empty rhetoric, “weight discrimination” is a measurable phenomenon.

In a study by Charles L. Baum, Ph.D., of Middle Tennessee State University, obesity was found to lower a woman’s annual earnings an average of 4.5 percent. Over a lifetime career, that can be as much as $100,000. Baum found that obesity for men could lower annual earnings by as much as 2.3 percent.

In a separate study by John H. Cawley, associate professor at Cornell University, a weight increase of 64 pounds above the average for white women was associated with 9 percent lower wages.

The CSWD says that heavier workers are also not given raises as often as thinner workers, citing a study of more than 2000 adults that found wage growth rates were 6 percent lower in a three-year period for heavier workers.

But before we condemn “weight discrimination,” we should ask whether these results make sense and are fair.

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