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The Obese States Of America, And How To Profit From It
Submitted by Daniel Drew of Dark Bid
Obese Nation: Investing In Profitable Heart Attacks
As The Washington Post recently reported, the average American woman now weighs as much as the average 1960s man. The average American has gained about 25-30 pounds over the last 50 years.
In an era where eating is celebrated, anorexia is feared, and "fat shaming" has become socially unacceptable, it's no surprise that the pounds are piling on. We are reminded of the power of language as new phrases are popularized to provide consolation to an obese nation: big-boned, heavyset, solid, plump, hefty, stout, portly, and pudgy. All of these words are designed to prevent us from facing the truth: 78 million of us are a bunch of fat asses. The reality is that losing weight is hard. Our bodies naturally gain weight, and we are biologically programmed to overeat. In the battle between you and your body, you will probably lose.
How can the cynical investor profit from the reckless self-indulgence of an obese populace? Like Tyler Durden making soap out of discarded fat from the dumpster of a liposuction clinic in the movie Fight Club, the shrewd investor can find a way to profit from the fat industry. If designed correctly, the "Obese Portfolio" will have returns that are correlated with Americans' widening waistlines.
The strategy for a Fat America is simple:
1. Long Health Care
2. Long Junk Food
3. Short Fitness
4. Short Healthy Food
There are a variety of ways to express this theme. I decided to look at iShares US Healthcare Providers ETF (IHF), Krispy Kreme Doughnuts (KKD), Weight Watchers (WTW), and Whole Foods Market (WFM). In the last ten years, the health care ETF is up 181%, and Krispy Kreme is up 144%. Whole Foods is only up 26%, and Weight Watchers absolutely tanked by dropping 87%.
As Americans continue to gain weight, heart attacks and emergency room visits should increase, doughnut consumption will rise, gyms will close, and healthy food stores will be stuck with inventory they cannot sell. But on Wall Street, greed is good. So if someone is going to have a heart attack, there's nothing wrong with making a few bucks from it right?
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I miss the 'old' Zero Hedge.
His name was Tyler Durden.
Agreed - way too much catering to the Fox/Rush dimwit crowd.
Yes cause after all the Liberal media is where the real truth is. We keep it dumb so you can keep up.
Fox and Rush are just as collectivist as all the other commies.
Bingo. Republicans and Democrats - the only real difference is to whom they wish to direct government largess and how that's sold to the public.
Profiteering isn't a solution, it is the problem.
Monetary Apostate
If we adopted the metric system everybodies weight would be cut in half.
"....Agreed - way too much catering to the Fox/Rush dimwit crowd..."
The simple answer is that sensationalistic type headlines generate more repeat web site visits, which generates more ad clicks, which generates more ad revenue...
Drudge Report paved that way a long time ago...
To maximize profits web site owners copy the format because it works...
Sensation like sex sells...
The more prevalent it becomes is a good example of how fast the 'ship' is sinking...
I must admit the articles being posted are a bit too MSM....
The Fox talking heads have an owner behind them who loves amnesty and open borders. Rush owns himself and breaks hard from Fox on illegal immigration, amnesty, the border etc
Conservative media = liberal media = bite-sized pre-digested tripe for small minds. Enjoy yours.
Yup - the media - all owned by a small cabal of very partial rich fucks.
The story isn't how the "news" is presented in terms of bias as much as what stories are overlooked, buried, and otherwise never mentioned.
Blows...tell us, the little people, how wonderful it is from your view, on high.
So simple, legalize crack.
Never seen a fat crack head. "Pipe skinny" will be the new rage.
pods
pods...I like it.
'Dat bitch be pipe skinny !'
That's one solution. I propose we start campaigns to push people to smoke, particularly obese people. That will aid with population reduction and help Social Security and Medicare as few people live to ripe old ages. In addition, there is the tax revenue.
:-)
"Which one of you pipe hittin' bitches can pass the salt?"
A little comic relief, most definitely NSFW:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVVEyZ9NVlg
Never let a good fatty go to waste.
Long mobility scooter manufactures and adult diaper manufactures
Don't knock something that is great for the US stock market. Besides, Jamie Dimon needs his second billion:
Coronary Capitalism
Kenneth Rogoff
But the obesity epidemic hardly looks like a growth killer. Highly processed corn-based food products, with lots of chemical additives, are well known to be a major driver of weight gain, but, from a conventional growth-accounting perspective, they are great stuff. Big agriculture gets paid for growing the corn (often subsidized by the government), and the food processors get paid for adding tons of chemicals to create a habit-forming – and thus irresistible – product. Along the way, scientists get paid for finding just the right mix of salt, sugar, and chemicals to make the latest instant food maximally addictive; advertisers get paid for peddling it; and, in the end, the health-care industry makes a fortune treating the disease that inevitably results.
Coronary capitalism is fantastic for the stock market, which includes companies in all of these industries. Highly processed food is also good for jobs, including high-end employment in research, advertising, and health care.
http://www.ipp.hit-u.ac.jp/tajika/lecture/material/141127_RogoffandLusti...
All you have to do is stick your head out the window and you'll see diseased land whales wallowing about all over, so it's easy to notice how poisoned, processed foods destroy people physically. It's a little harder to see what equally poisoned, depraved and pornographic entertainment does to people's minds, but it's just as real.
Fear not, friends! The fda has promised to save us! Trans-fats will be illegal in a few years. We're all gonna be saved. God bless the ussa govt. I hope they come into our bedrooms soon and save us there as well.
WallSt to US citizens: Eat grease!
WallSt to EU citizens: Eat Greece!
In 1960, when America was skinnier than today, Americans did eat grease, and fat, without guilt or reserve. The low fat propaganda took care of that.
Must be why oil is trading higher. Fatter people use more gas to move around.
The oil surplus has nearly reached a record. We just surpassed the 1997-98 run where oil dropped to the teens and gas dropped under $1 a gallon. Yet somehow gasoline is about ready to break above $3 on a national average with oil trading in the $60 range. With another two quarters of excess supply we'll be in the longest stretch of excess supply in history.
Hey Hey now - I self identify as being thin.
No way would I short health food and fitness. All the fatties have poor self esteem, and will spend billions on trying to be fit and look good.
I do see a lot of fat asses but I also see a lot more fit people as well so its a 50 50 . Older generations IE Generation "Carbohydrates are good for you" seem to be the most heavy and the most pharmaceutical dependent, In the 60 to 70 year old category... just goes to show you the intelligences of that era, just look at Congress as an example.
Carbos are fine ... but not refined carbos.
Whole food, plant based.
u wrong bro, u wrong
Name us a low glycemic whole grain food.
Right (sarc).
Actually, this is probably MOA for Agenda 21.
Guy Who Manages $112 Billion Sees No Bond Buyers
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-06-15/guy-who-manages-112-bil...
On a personal level this article shows that embracing regular exercise and radical diet (i.e. paleo) is a way for smart individuals to invest in themselves for the future. Avoiding the sick-care system in the U.S. will be wise.
Also, given how few investment opportunties there will be in the future focusing on personal health/sanity will still pay great dividends.
Read "The Blue Zones" and see how much meat is eaten by the longest lived people on the planet.
Make fat shaming a hate crime. That'll fix it.
They call it sizeism. Guess what? No surprise that the Israelis are encouraging the right to be fat for their American livestock.
From the University of Tel Aviv
Abstract:
Policy discussions on the increasing weight of Americans, within the antidiscrimination framework. http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2145577
Protein has already been banned. Carbs or GMO is all that's left. Besides, eating is one of the few things people can still enjoy in this life without being closely monitored yet.
Considering shitty looking tbones at Walmart are selling for $20, you are technically correct.
No worries for me, I don't even fall on that graph. LMFATAO.
Fattening food is also cheaper, and as more and more Americans fall out of the labor force and fall behind the rising cost of living, they will turn to cheaper options in order to survive. This means eating more pizza, fast food, junk, etc. The continued erosion of the middle class will contribute to this obesity epidemic.
The worst food is the cheapest and most subsidized.
And most wheat and oats are now soaked in glyphosate too as farmers use glyphosate to "dry" crops.
So pasta and bread, oatmeal? Way worse than they used to be.
Potatoes? Loads of fungicides.
Ground beef? Over $5 a pound for the cheap conventional stuff.
Apples have gotten high too, even the conventional ones.
I think the only traditional cheap eats I can think of that haven't gotten either much worse for you, or much more expensive are bananas, beans, and rice.
You can buy a bag of chips or cookies for the price of one big apple. Heck, right now at Kroger you can get three big bags of potato chips for less than the price of one pound of ground beef.
Pasta, Bread, Oatmeal, Rice and Potatoes are all synthesized into sugar by the body, triggering the insulin response, which results in storage by the body in the form of fat cells. And you'll be hungry again shortly afterwards, because the body so efficiently processes these inputs.
If you want to lose weight, you want to eat more proteins and fats, and less fast carbs. The fat is digested in the gut more slowly, which delays the hunger response, avoids triggering fat storage, and avoids more consumption intake.
And, of course, exercise to increase metabolic rate to naturally burn calories by fueling muscles etc.
Just for fun I did a cost per calorie (no nutritional considerations involved) comparison between a box of Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pies and some Kashi crap granola bars that my ex used to buy all of the time.
Cost per calorie of the Kashi was 300 - 400% greater. I was surprised at the extent of the difference.
I fell into that with purchasing Truvia for my coffee, an exorbitantly expensive alternative sugar that is supposed to be made from the stevia plant (trying to minimize sugar). Turns out that it's 90% GMO corn and like 5% stevia. I decided to pay extra to die as fast as possible.
And the pricetag fpr Obama(sick)care will rise. Imagine if all that friggin money had gone to health education, and adjunct services? The payoff would have been huge, except the medical and medical insurance industry would tank -- can't have that happen.
The US government and interested parties have been propagandizing low fat diets for 40 years now, at every level of education, in all media. We are doing what the USDA and sick care industries recommended.
I met a Jamaican in phoenix once.
He was long fat white chicks
Obesity is just one target area. This is 'Murca so going long vanity, pride, ignorance, greed, self-absorption, avarice, gluttony, envy, self-attention whoring and self-righteous, undeserved exceptionality should all prove profitable until this shit pile falls to ashes.
Try Mannkind--- MNKD -- parterning with Sanofi to produce, distribute insulin that can be inhaled at mealtimes.
http://whythefutureisbrightformannkind.blogspot.com/
Try Mannkind--- MNKD -- parterning with Sanofi to produce, distribute insulin that can be inhaled at mealtimes.
http://whythefutureisbrightformannkind.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-american...
"and we are biologically programmed to overeat. In the battle between you and your body, you will probably lose."
I say Bullshit. If that were true than it would have always been this way. Just another excuse.
I get absolutely nauseated at Walmart watching those Walruses abuse the motorized chairs.
Nope, just a bunch of fat, lazy, Hippo's eating two days of food at one meal.
Bliss point techniques, adjusting the addition of and ratios of flavorings, salt, sugar, fat, and other carbohydrates, makes food more & more addictive. The flavorings fool our taste and preferences to eat something that we normally wouldn't eat, or eat more than we normally wood. On the Serengeti plains of Africa, wild animals naturally choose the grasses high in phosphorous because they taste better. Humans are not free to choose, and we are fooled time & again by Big Food, to buy and eat crap. Our bodies yearn for the nutrition we need but cannot obtain. Rabbit is missing at least one essential fatty acid. If you eat rabbit because they are plentiful, you slowly starve to death, and have ravenous hunger, causing you to eat greater and greater quantities of rabbit. Eventually, our brain tells us to sit down and/or sleep to conserve energy as we are starving to death on too much rabbit. Sound familiar? The modern equivalent are fat buts on the couch watching TV while eating more and more Doritos.
For example, a hundred years ago, the potato was a rich source of Vitamin A and C, and many trace nutrients. Not today, as the typical potato has lost almost all of its Vitamin A, lost 47% of their copper, lost 45% of their iron and lost 35% of their calcium. It isn't just the potato that has suffered this terrible fate. Many fruits, vegetables, grains, meats, and other foods are becoming more and more depleted. For commercially produced chicken, there is now more fat, and the fat Omega-3 to Omega-6 ratio has totally flipped to the unhealthy side in the last 50 years (Ref: BANT http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2005/may/15/foodanddrink.shopping3 ). In other words, the good food isn't so good anymore. Foods high in carbohydrates are now known to be addictive, and often result is a positive feedback loop, causing us to consume more of what is not good for us.
But wont the underwriters of the Obamafraud (the Banks) have to shell out and pay for medical expenses until they snuff it. The banks would want people to snuff it asap, but they need more people to steal from.
Ahhh, now I get it, Hello Mexicans welcome to Amedica.
I would look for a company that runs dialysis and other lifestyle-disease treatment centers ... Not long ago, a kidney dialysis clinic opened in the large office building I have space in.
They had an open house and invited the other tenants, among others to stop by, have a bite, meet and greet.
The general manager of the dialysis clinic was a nice guy, but very blunt: he told me that "most of our customers , once they start dialysis, die within 5-10 years. I asked him, "what would happen if more people ate properly, and exercised?" He said "we would be out of business!"
So, LONG on this part of the industry.
You need fat to survive......it has all the flavor and calories...the good stuff....when the SHTF..you want fat to survive
Coconut oil...better for you than the heated deoderized liquid vegetable oils and lasts longer too.
To a point.
Damn right Bro. Bring it!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnSKsLdVL5I
Want to lose weight, stop eating gluten. Gluten is evil.
I like gluten. I always ask for extra.
Gluten is simply a blend of two natural protiens commonly found in wheat.
Maybe. New hybridized wheat does have more gluten.
But seems more likely that for many it is the glyphosate and how it effects gut bacteria.
Roundup is the earliest formulation of glyphosate. Enjoy your roundup pizza and subs people.
Meanwhile, I'll enjoy my 6'1 185 pound frame.
The key ingredient of your 6'1" 185 pound frame is carbon which is also a key chemical component of carbon monoxide, a deadly poison. It makes just as much sense to avoid carbon as it does to avoid gluten which is simply a natural protien, unless you happen to be one of the very few people who are gluten intollerant.
Uh huh. I lost 25 pounds by simply giving up gluten. Didn't exercise, changed nothing about my daily routine. You must be wheat farmer, go away.
No, I'm a buckwheat farmer.
Think for a moment what would happen to the health (?) care industry if even 5% of the population became healthy - i.e., no need for pharmaceuticals... What about 10%...? Ah well... There is nothing that says the U.S. can't suffer a famine brought about by nearly any means - naturally caused or not. Nor is there anything written that the U.S. could never suffer the consequences of an economic implosion, which by itself could bring on a famine. Yes indeed, 'health' can be brought to bear, sometimes in the most unique ways...
Just an FYI for the chubby among us. If you want to lose weight without starving, eat a whole-food vegan diet. My mom dropped 30 lbs in 3 months without exercise, and while I haven't lost any weight since I'm already in decent shape, my bench shot up 40 lbs since I switched my diet about 3 months ago. It's cheaper and healthier for you than a paleo diet, and you get to eat more because the food is far less calorie dense. Try it out for a month, you'll be shocked at the benefits. Also, my mood significantly improved. The massive amounts of carbs caused me to workout longer and harder because I had so much more energy to burn.
Oh, one other word of advice. Buy the best rice cooker you can afford and nuke your vegtables in the microwave. It's worth the cash for a high quality rice cooker on this lifestyle. Bean burgers, burritos and pasta are also your friend. If you want a full guide to a vegan diet, google "Dr. John McDougall Free Program" for a diet designed by an MD.
Nothing against it, but IME diet isn't one size fits all. See the recent finding that a low protein diet is good in middle age, but higher protein is better in old age.
Also there are things we get from meat that aren't easily available in other foods. Of course you can supplement.
Interesting bit on the damage done by agriculture:
http://matadornetwork.com/bnt/why-vegetarianism-will-not-save-the-world/
And some ideas on feeding ourselves more sustainably. Doesn't seem likely that we can feed as many as we now have in a sustainable way.
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/06/08/fix-soil-feed-planet-save-wo...
Those articles are bizarre. The vast bulk of US agriculture today goes toward growing things like alfalfa to feed cattle. It takes about 80 times the resources to raise cattle vs. growing grains that are directly fed to humans. Cattle take enormous amounts of water, land, feed, healthcare, etc.. etc.. 29,000,000 acres of alfalfa was grown in 2009 vs. 126,000 of Broccoli.
As for the high protein is better for you in old age, that's totally absurd. You have less need for muscle development in old age and a diet high in animal products will promote cancer growth and cardiovascular disease. Vegans have the lowest BMIs and the lowest all-cause mortality out of any group. Some of the longest lived people in the world are the Seventh Day Adventists in CA who eat a predominately vegitarian diet.
Since I changed my diet, my triglycerides literally were cut in half and my cholesterol dropped to the 150s.
Don't know your age, but this was the study:
http://articles.latimes.com/2014/mar/04/science/la-sci-sn-high-protein-d...
An article published in the journal Cell Metabolism says that, over an 18-year study period, middle-aged Americans who had the highest consumption of protein were more than four times as likely to die of cancer or diabetes, and twice as likely to die of any cause, than those whose diets were lowest in protein.
But a high-protein diet had the opposite effect on Americans 66 and older, a group of Americans and Italian researchers found. Those whose diets were highest in protein were 60% less likely to die of cancer and 28% less likely to die of any cause than were those whose protein intake was lowest.
“Your stage in life matters,” said biogerontologist Valter Longo, director of USC’s Longevity Institute and lead author of the paper, which explores the role of dietary protein from the cellular level to the population level. “Some have said for years that proteins are bad. That’s half right and half wrong.”
Here's a direct quote from the study you just linked:
"Based on these results, we stratified the population into two age groups, those ages 50–65 (n = 3,039) and those ages 66+ (n = 3,342), and re-examined relationships between protein and cause-specific mortality. Among those ages 50–65, higher protein levels were linked to significantly increased risks of all-cause and cancer mortality (Table 1). In this age range, subjects in the high protein group had a 74% increase in their relative risk of all-cause mortality (HR: 1.74; 95% CI: 1.02–2.97) and were more than four times as likely to die of cancer (HR: 4.33; 95% CI: 1.96–9.56) when compared to those in the low protein group. None of these associations was significantly affected by controlling for percent calories from total fat or for percent calories from total carbohydrates. However, when the percent calories from animal protein was controlled for, the association between total protein and all-cause or cancer mortality was eliminated or significantly reduced, respectively, suggesting animal proteins are responsible for a significant portion of these relationships. When we controlled for the effect of plant-based protein, there was no change in the association between protein intake and mortality, indicating that high levels of animal proteins promote mortality and not that plant-based proteins have a protective effect (Table S5)."
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S155041311400062X
If you read their discussion on the results for the 66+population, they suggest that the elderly need to eat a diet containing at least 10% protein, which is typical of a plant based diet. The elderly who are eating a diet of less than 10% calories from protein must be eating a diet of nothing but junk food, which would create a protein defficiency and lead to the observed increased mortality. They defined the "high" protein diet as being 18% of calories from protein. The average steak has over 30% calories from protein, while black beans are around 25% protein and a Milky Way bar is about 3% protein. It's little wonder that the elderly who are consuming a diet of only 4-7% protein have an highly increased mortality rate.
I love the down votes. It's a form of comedy to me when people down-vote heathy eating comments. It highlights how insane our society has become.
If you want to get a million down-votes on ZH, recommend going vegan, LOL. Works every time.
I was vegan for 17 years (now I'm nearly vegan); everyone else in my extended family is an omnivore. I'm slim; everyone else in my extended family is obese. I'm this way for ethical reasons, but it really does keep one's weight down, too.
But it's that darned gluten, LOL (actually I do think the Round-up is a factor).
I notice moar 4XB shirts on the shelves these days. Pretty large shirts, I must say.
Americans wear their adipose layers as both a reality-shield and a dowry-the ultimate in wearable wealth.
Contrary to most, I believe that many subconciously love being super fat. It is an ancient sign of comfort, ease and abundance.
Low body fat can be a curse under certain circumstances.
The chubby ones are prepared for the famine that is coming to the land.
The obese, though- they won't fair so well, too slow and out of shape.
"When He broke the third seal, I heard the third living creature saying, "Come." I looked, and behold, a black horse; and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, "A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not damage the oil and the wine." - Revelation 6:5,6
Chubby good, obese bad?
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/274624.php
Caryl Nowson, professor of nutrition and aging at Deakin University in Melbourne, and colleagues looked at links BMI and risk of death in people aged 65 and over, and found those with the lowest risk of death had a BMI of around 27.5.
For their study, the team pooled and re-analyzed results from studies published between 1990 and 2013 that had examined links between BMI and risk of death in people aged 65 and over.
Altogether, the analysis covered over 200,000 older people followed for an average of 12 years, and revealed, with reference to BMI in the range 23.0 to 23.9, that there was no increased risk of death for people in the overweight range, but:
Prof. Nowson says for people aged 65 and over, by the WHO standards, being overweight is not associated with an increased risk of death, and that "it is those sitting at the lower end of the normal range that need to be monitored, as older people with BMIs less than 23 are at increased risk of dying."
It may depend on where you are. In states like Minnesota, which has a generally very active population, obesity is generally less and people are taking more seriously their health. Doesn't mean there aren't obese people, and generally they are the welfare or trailer park types. In areas with higher welfare or less active populations, undoubtedly you'll see more.
What is the height difference of people in this time frame?
Long NVO.
This is a worldwide phenomenon,but the Americans and Mexicans are vying for the worlds fattest title. Mexicans claim their ancient corn was replaced with American corn. Dump Monsanto and corn.
Americans are fat because they are rich, that's the main reason.
Let's examine the new anti-obesity program by the pro-American Ukrainian government.
It lowered the average salary from $500 to $100, increased all taxes and gasoline prices.
https://youtu.be/mkoPq5AOCOA