Chart of the Day (4): Trimming the real fat in the U.S. economy
Friday, September 10, 2010 at 12:01AM 
FT full-pager analysis.
The tale of the tape.
We're not way out of proportion (pun intended), but why should we lead on this one?
The weird factoids: Rich men are more likely to be fat than poor men, but poor women are significantly more likely to be fat than rich women.
So the classic rich couple is the heavy-set man with the thin wife and the classic poor couple is the skinny guy with the chunky wife.
The second chart seems to explain the epidemic: we've just changed our diet considerably since the 1960s, because when I was growing up, being overweight was really fairly uncommon. Now, you walk around and its the skinny people who stick out--really a stunning turn in just a couple of generations (1970-2010).
Gotta believe it can be reversed if it happened that fast.
I recently dropped 20 pounds and it feels great. The biggest driver for me? I'm just getting bored with food, especially when I travel because so much of it is so tasteless that you just start wondering, "Why bother?"
Reader Comments (1)
Interesting chart on obesity. A. Korea so much higher than Japan? That's a real switch. I haven't lived in Korea for 20 years. They were as thin as Japanese at that time. Now look at them. A lot can happen in 20 year. Top changes for Korea in the past 20 years 1. Feminine men. 2. Population decline 3. Now obesity. B. Japan looks like a real champion on this ranking and France is surprisingly slim.