On the Menu in America: Obesity -- and Economic Ruin

Most Americans say obesity is either an "extremely" or a "very serious" problem to society, even more than cigarettes, according to a recent Gallup poll. Let me tell you, this insight hasn’t come a moment too soon.

At $2.5 trillion annually, America’s biggest budget problem remains healthcare costs. The U.S. healthcare bill is three times the size of the defense budget and nearly two times the whole Russian economy. It is also roughly twice the size of the whole Indian economy, and India has a billion-plus population.

These comparisons always blow me away because healthcare is breaking America faster than promises to pay Social Security and other pension benefits. And healthcare is growing at an average of 6% per year, which means the new costs over the next decade will be a staggering $10 trillion. That is new cost over and above where we currently are.

Let me cut to the chase. What's driving these costs are epidemic rates of obesity and diabetes. Obesity is the primary cause of Type 2 Diabetes and a major contributor to chronic disease. Chronic disease, like diabetes, is the engine for much of what goes wrong with many Americans’ health. If the country knocked out obesity, I’d argue that the United States of America would roar back -- unburdened by unsustainable healthcare costs -- and the country’s economy would be a hell of a lot stronger than it is today.

If Americans became a lot more physically fit, the $2.5 trillion would shrink dramatically. Even if it dropped by a third, the country’s economy would be fixed, in my view.

Simply put, many Americans just weigh too much. They eat tens of millions of cows, pigs, and chickens each year. Probably no tribe of people in the history of humankind has devoured this many animals.

Now eating these animals is just fine. This isn’t an argument for a national conversion to vegetarianism. But raising a cow or a chicken and then butchering it is very, very expensive. Grain is more expensive now than ever and each animal requires a great deal of clean water through life, and then a great deal more through slaughtering. Americans have to substantially cut their meat consumption.

And there’s a potential additional financial benefit to doing this. America’s farmers and ranchers could still produce a full herd, but sell the new overage to overseas markets, especially China. If Americans would be willing to eat fewer hogs, cattle, and chickens -- and export what they don’t eat -- the country could work off the massive debt it currently owes China. Let their citizens consume the animals Americans don’t.

Here’s a simple, clear recommendation: Americans should cut the number of cows, pigs, and chickens they eat by one-third. This could start at the city level, with business and government leaders creating campaigns and initiatives to reduce meat consumption in their towns. If such efforts were to spread from city to city throughout the U.S., it would be breathtaking and this would fix the biggest problem facing the country’s economy. It would cost less for Americans to eat -- and eating less would cut the country’s obesity rates, its healthcare costs, and thus its national debt.