How Did Americans Get So Fat, In Seven Charts
Americans are fat. They are so fat very few would even bother to click on a hyperlink in this article explaining how fat they are, so instead we will present an animated chart showing the severity of the US obesity problem over the past 30 years.
Cartoons aside, here are the facts: today two-thirds of U.S. adults are overweight or obese. Half are afflicted with chronic conditions like diabetes or high blood pressure that can often be prevented with better diets, but aren't and as a result debt-funded healthcare costs have exploded, and while this chronic obesity has made pharma companies richer beyond their wildest dreams, it means future US healthcare spending and welfare obligations are unsustainable.
America didn't get this way overnight. The average calories available to the average American increased 25 percent, to more than 2500, between 1970 and 2010, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. There was no extra meal added to the day, instead an evolution in the type of foods Americans eat led to steady growth in calories.
Added fats and grains account for a growing share of total caloric intake. These two categories, which include oils and fats in processed foods and flour in cereals and breads, made up about 37 percent of our diet in 1970. By 2010, they were 46 percent—a larger share of the growing pie. One of the main factor: cost; the increasingly more caloric foods become progressively cheaper and more affordable. The result: more of the lower and middle classes gravitated toward it, leading to the epidemic shown above.
Here, courtesy of Bloomberg, are seven charts showing the detail behind America's troubling obesity trend.
First, this is where America's calories come from.
Cheese is replacing milk.
A lot more fat goes into our foods.
Calories from wheat, rice, and corn have increased. This includes refined grains like white bread that provide calories but are stripped of much of the nutrients in whole grains.
There are some indications that Americans are changing their diets to become healthier. For example, we're swapping red meat for chicken.
And though corn syrup boomed since the 1970s, the total amount of sweeteners we eat has declined. That's partly because Americans are drinking less soda.
These positive changes haven't negated the overall increase in calories on our plates. More than two-thirds of U.S. adults are overweight or obese, compared to less than half in the 1970s.
The government's dietary guidelines are simple: "Almost all people in the United States could benefit from shifting choices to better support healthy eating patterns." Right, now if only the government would also subsidize this healthy - which means more expensive - eating. We won't hold our breath: after all the massive pharma lobby would generate far less profits for its clients if US obesity were to sharply decline as a result of someone doing the right thing.
So until something does take place to shock the US out of its fatty momentum, here is Family Guy.
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Yes, there is a vast difference in the amount of calories burned based on how much weight you are moving. Much of the overweight problem also has to do with the constant advice from scientism to do cardio. And much like the bike, most cardio activity is with some sort of machine which reduces friction and gives you a mechanical advantage; thus less calories are burned.
Training MMA, cutting wood, powerlifting, etc. can cut calories in about 10% of the time of most cardio. Heck, even hunting and hiking is vastly different from walking in the park. You have a pack on, you have to duck under branches, climb over deadfall, go up and down hills, and really think about what you are doing.
That's what I'd like information on. Just how many calories are stored because no one uses their brains? When you powerlift or take martial arts you are making yourself more tired because of the mental effort, and the breaking down of the neuropathways takes a lot of energy to prepare. Reading takes more energy than watching tv, and writing even more than that.
The brain is a muscle and it must work in conjunction with all of the other muscles for a person to be healthy.
The other problem here, which most will not like, is that people simply work too hard and have no time to recover. Studies show that hard work like powerlifting can only be done for an hour or so (3 days a week), otherwise the body does not properly recover. Similarly, there is no way to recover from 8-12 hour working days. Humans worked 4-hours a day (28-hours weekly) for millions of years for a reason: the earth provided enough resources for people to get by on that much work (and allow the resources to replenish). No wonder that in a society of megalomaniacs working 60-hour weeks both the landscape and the humans are sick. Resources of the earth are depleted and wasted, just like the minds and bodies of men.
Ironically, it is the depletion and waste that makes people fat, not the excess in itself.
brain uses 20% of intake. It's the most energy expensive organ in the body. You're very right. When I was going through undergrad I used to heat up a room with my head.
Your brain uses a little more energy than usual during some phases of sleep but otherwise its calorie expenditure is invariant to activity or task.
I'm jealous! I have a set of hardly used quads because no one around here does that sort of thing anymore. I miss it a lot. Great exercise. Get the 187 knee and elbow pads. They work great.
Some of us eat all of these but in lesser quantities and stay lean.
Where is the quantity chart?
I was going to read this but got bored when I saw math and charts and crap so I opted to go get a cheeseburger instead. Did I miss anything?
Well, you failed to mention if you had bacon on your cheeseburger.
The meat, cheese and bacon are good for you. Because of the bread, you are likely a fat fuck.
Add a vew pickle slices. Everyone knows dem veggies offset the bacon.
Energy intake > energy output = lots of fat fsckin' Americans.
Try energy intake < energy output for a while.
The spoon made me fat! Spoon-free zones now! Seriously though, it's also chemicals. E.G., hormones that increase milk production also cause young woman - who drink milk - to grow larger breasts at an earlier age. And, if your water supply contains runoff from dairy farms - Ohio river for example - these hormones and more are in your faucet water. Filter, even your shower!
Monsanto plays no part in this? Bullshit!
The Monsatan zio family were early players in the slave trade. GMO's just a more recent edition of it.
Electro food shock therapy http://hedgeaccordingly.com/2015/01/fda-approves-first-obesity-treatment...
Malthus was right, just not about food. Population will increase beyond the ability of the economy to create high paying jobs. Deflation and the ability to live well at a lower income is the cure. Excessive credit creation without regard to productive investment is the disease.
Malthus was in fact completely wrong. What he should have said was "the earth will support so many humans that their individual asshole factor ratings will go through the roof and no one will want to live there any more in spite of there being adequate food for them"
I predict it won't be glo-bull warming or pollution or overpopulation that leads mankind to explore other solar systems but rather this same "asshole factor"
Your Quote: "individual asshole factor ratings"
Are off the charts!
Malthus couldn't account for Human's ability to export extinctions to other species. We don't die, we destroy some other species habitats so that we can continue to grow. e.g. enormous monoculture farms, canadian oil sands etc.
I'm continually astounded by the ability of people to misunderstand simple written english. People see 'Malthus' and freak at the rest of what I wrote. It agrees 100% with what is written here on a daily basis. It only changes the theoritical framework from ripping Keynes or praising Mises to accepting another classical economist who had a theory that explains the world well. Only he was centuries too early. High paying jobs are the resources that will be in scarcity. Not food. Credit not accompanied by productive investment will make it much worse since payments will be a drain on income without a matching benefit.
Now ... please feel free to go back and continue missing the point. We need more long, ponderous articles that repeat the message of the last long, ponderous article. And don't forget the graphs.
Hobo
Your point on Malthus was well taken. And Central banking's disconnect to the real economy even more so.
Zh has an eclectic audience, and trolls abound. Don't take arrows personally, up or down.
I like your stuff. The more others understand the seeds of destruction planted in this country, whether in central banking or food, the better.
Keep it up.
K
After reading the comments, I didn't find many talking about portion size! I would posit that is one of the major reasons people are becoming obese. I recall a number of years ago visiting a good French restaurant (in Canada) and having appetizer, main and dessert, and feeling comfortably full. The portions were such that a person could have three courses and feel satisfied, but not stuffed. I then invited some friends to the same excellent restaurant (in my books) who complained bitterly that there was no food on their plates.
I moved to the mid-west (on the Illinois side of St Louis) for a few months. There a steak had to be served hangng off both sides of the plate with a mountain of fries or a huge baked potato or people felt ripped off.
So one reason would be increasing portion size.
The other (as to why the French are not fat) is walking! Other than in the centre of some cities, North Amercial culture demands that one take a car to go anywhere. Even if we had 10 minutes to walk to a store - there are no stores within 10 minutes walk!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
Sugar: The Bitter Truth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
Sugar: The Bitter Truth
Eating processed and fast food instead of preparing meals from healthy fresh ingredients
Little or no exercise, spending too much time commuting to "jobs" so they can feed the debt beast.
That was several years ago, it is over 70% today and still on the rise. The vast majority of health issues here in USSA today are directly linked to overweight and obesity issues. Various diabetic issues, heart and circulatory issues and of course joints being stressed with that excess weight. But this article only gets part of the story accurate and completely leaves out the other big component . A regular exercise regimen. No mattter what guru tells you other wise there are in fact only two components to weight issues. The amount of calories consumed and the amount burned. Very simplistic dynamics. Those calories will either be turned into fat or muscle, your choice ! Of course you can get into the types of calories and such matters as glycemic index and such , but common sense should always prevail regarding ones health and fitness. No need to complicate any of it. Good nutrition and regular exercise are the only secrets if it can be called a secret. I often wonder why the majority want to live so incredibly unhealthy and unhappy ? Especailly when it is completely unnecessary and rather easy to resolve and live very well indeed with few or no limits.
I have said many times Americans have grown, fat, dumb, lazy, spoiled , apathetic and a bit cowardly. Nothing new really for the last 40 years at least ? There is a much better way to live and THINK !
Wow72, you with the marijuana leaf icon, what's so wrong with drug addiction? You ever see a fat junkie? No? Me neither. But with pot, man! With pot, man, you can go through a bucket of Breyers cherry-vanilla in no time. Like, wow, Wow, imagine a whole nation toking up and getting the. . .MUNCHIES! All this obesity began when we started smoking DOPE! Light up, take a few hits and. . ."What have we got to eat, Fat Freddy?" Smoking dope is a perfect predictor of being HUNGRY! The chart above sets a baseline of 1970. Slide that baseline back to 1960 (in my case) and you'll find an even lower percentage of fatties.
And today, with all the poverty and joblessness and lots and lots of free time to wait at the Manpower front door! Poverty increases dope smoking all getout! Remember Freewheelin' Frank's dictum: Drugs will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no drugs."
My grand daddy owned a Pepsi-Cola franchise. I been drinking a six-pack of Coke or Pepsi every day since 1943 and my maximum weight ever was 190 pounds on a six-foot frame. No health problems and good teeth. So much for the evil cola myth.
Back before the days of political correctness and "sensitivity", the problem of overweight was solved by mocking fat people mercilessly. Make fun of them. Don't include them in cool people's activities. Scorn them. Do that enough and they'll lose weight. You're doing them a favor. By not mocking them, by not excluding them, by not scorning them you do them the greatest injustice. By not mocking them, not excluding them, not scorning them you are nothing more than an enabler. You might as well hand them a dozen Krispy-Kremes.
Try this on sometime. Do it today. Pick the fat person of your choice, look them over and ask, "Are you on a diet these days?" They will answer, "No!" You then look them over again and say, "I didn't think so."
Prepared foods. Almost everything has HFCS in it. Bread, sausage, you name it, they dump that sludge in it.
Take my syrup away from me and I'll cut ya.
I hear a lot about high fructose corn syrup but don't believe much of it. The magic quantity is "self control"
In one study I am aware of, rats addicted to cocaine are exposed to HFCS, and get to eat all they want. When they reintroduce cocaine, the rats will pick the HFCS every time. HFCS actually lights up the same areas of the brain that coke lights up. It is as or more addictive.
I eat paleo. When I let myself drift to sugar during the holidays (little treats here and there) I actually go through a withdrawl period where I am cranky and crave it for a few days when I try to get off it again. Takes a bit to reset back to where I was. It does take will power, but if you are eating it and don't know how powerful it is, it is pretty hard to know on your own, without research, that you are going to need to go through a bad period to get off of it. Most folks will just cave to the craving, be ashamed, and not know that it is the substance, not them.
Once I know it is the substance, I can brace myself, go through detox, and know that things will change if I wait it out. I am extra gentle, not judgemental of myself when I do go through that.
Knowledge in this case really is power.
Also, sugar causes inflammation in the body, and the only way to cure inflammation is through rest and/or food. Many people have no time for rest so this ups the quantities of food. Very addictive behaviour.
A new theory on depression suggests that it is this very inflammation which causes the flu-like depression symptoms and that the mental changes occur only after this inflammation. Also a big factor in eating excessively.
One does have to be careful with the eating. Especially as you age. Exercise is pretty important too though because
your body really does not want to come to a caloric stand still.
A case study if anyone is interested (I was): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15123503?dopt=Abstract
I'm calling bullshit on the cocaine versus sugar experiment. There is just no way.
Sugar == mild dopamine release
Cocaine == massive mega release of dopamine.
The anti sugar crowd will say anything to diss sugar. Sugar is not that good if used correctly. What are you some sort of Bloomberg?
Take a look at this google search I did for you:
http://tinyurl.com/hgpqss9
HFCS is basically glucose with fructose as sweetener. It's an "instant hit". I mean literally 15 seconds. It's much worse for you than sucrose (cane sugar) which your body has to break down into glucose to make use of.
They put it in everything because it's cheap. And it's cheap because it's overproduced, and it's overproduced because it's subsidised. It's subsidised because the farming lobby have good lobbyists.
"Lysine production for animal feed is a major global industry, reaching in 2009 almost 700,000 tonnes for a market value of over €1.22 billion.[42] Lysine is an important additive to animal feed because it is a limiting amino acid when optimizing the growth of certain animals such as pigs and chickens for the production of meat. Lysine supplementation allows for the use of lower-cost plant protein (maize, for instance, rather than soy) while maintaining high growth rates."
Lysine is extracted from corn to fatten pigs and chickens on a cheaper diet. There is a reason why "corn-fed" was a synonym for "bulky" in the early 1900's. Bulk up, baby!
If white bread wasn't "fortified" and "enriched" your body wouldn't recognize it as food.
Please don't use the term white bread as I've now been triggered and feelings are hurt. I'm calling the sjw police.
I call micro-aggression on "white bread" also. I feel like the hate here is getting out of control and feel threatened. Perhaps "bleached flour bread" in the future. And please don't refer the salted crisp biscuits as "crackers" either, this is 2016, those terms are no longer acceptable.
White trash meat coverings
Interesting look at what the world eats: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2319825/The-great-global-food-ga...
The amount of packaged crap and it's cost in $$ and health...
They always ALWAYS say sugar,,, but most items are made with fake sugars and the worst is aspartame. Aspartame was introduced in the 1980's. Think about that then look at the charts again. Coincidence?
A little known fact about aspartame is that the process includes GMO and you can thank Donald Rumsfeld for blessing us with this product as he helped to get it approved. The product evades GMO labeling because supposedly the gmo bacteria is removed from the final product.
"Monsanto, the pioneering GM food giant which makes aspartame, often uses genetically engineered bacteria to produce the sweetener at its US production plants."
"Whether such a contaminating compound will be toxic, or not is completely unknowable until empirical studies are done to test toxicity," said Dr John Fagan, a former genetic engineer who now heads Genetic ID, the world's leading GM test centre. "No such studies have been done, or at least they have not been placed in the public domain.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/worlds-top-sweetener-is-made-with-gm-bacteria-1101176.html
Endocrine disrupters, they have become ubiquitous in our environment in the last 75 years.
https://www.google.com/webhp?complete=0&gws_rd=ssl#complete=0&q=endocrin...
Most People were skinny throughout most of history. what changed?
1.crappy food and lots of it for cheap
2. television and a declining amount of physical labor
3.endocrine disrupters in our food,air and water.
We hit the obesity trifecta.
I used to own one of their suppliers. Genex. Monsanto cut their contract and then bought up the pieces on the cheap. Nice guys.
Peasants eat cheap food, and lots of it when they feel their existence threatened. Obesity is the result of money printing and crushing poverty, policies of the slaveowners. The difference today is that we are living in a post scarcity economy, and food is still cheap despite the economic disaster caused by Top Men and their so called System.
Hogwash. The vast majority of people in the world are poor, and thin.
"I'm not too fat; I'm just too short for my weight!"
I'm at my perfect weight. If I was 9'4!